#this was an experiment - I’ve never done this style digital. I hope you like it 🥺

[ivymoonstudios]

he gave me the moon and the stars. infinity.

[hanzajesthanza]

by the way, i wanted to thank everybody for so many kind, encouraging, and thoughtful responses to my first video. (slight vent post :>)

it did indeed take a lot of work and a lot out of me, a lot of research, multiple stupid all-nighters… but as unhealthy as it was, it was actually really good for me, i think. it was a real experiment, i honestly haven’t worked so hard on something since my thesis to graduate last year.

i felt cathartic, that i had it in me to make something like this, that i’m not useless…

i mean, i know i’m not, but ever since graduation i’ve felt so, so burned out and as a result of that, just, stupid and inexperienced compared to everyone else in my field, socially isolated, agoraphobic, even, in some cases.

(i’m one of those people that worked really hard in high school and college, and now that i’ve graduated it’s like, who am i? what is my purpose? what is my value? add burnout to that, and you have a year of feeling guilty that i’m not killing myself constantly with projects.)

so to be able to actually fucking make something that not only took a lot of work, but had me constantly pushing my comfort zone, reorganizing my space (physically and digitally) and just trying my hardest to get it done… on top of it, being really, really be passionate about what i was working on… it feels like…

it feels like, if a close friend of yours died a year ago… and you went numb with mourning… but then you just got news that they’re alive…

but the thing is, that friend is you.

it’s funny how dramatic i’m being, because i actually decided today that i don’t like the video much, and that it’s not very well-produced. (it only took me two-to-four days to start hating my artwork, of course. well, i had a good time being proud of myself while it lasted).

it’s something along the lines of calanthe’s “i hope my outburst didn’t offend you. the form, not the content.” i hope this video didn’t offend you—the form, not the content. i’m secure in the content, the research. but the form… again, like calanthe’s, very ‘in the moment.’

i woke up this morning really mad at myself for making some creative decisions that i feel cheapen the whole thing. (i don’t know what posessed me to use my accent color for a background color, it makes the whole thing look gaudy and unprofessional. i guess i just didn’t want a boring white background, but ugh… that is going to be on my list of regrets for a while).

but i placated myself knowing that the video does its job as a biography and a source of information. and the fact that youtubers sometimes remake their first videos later in their careers. (well, at least my first video is a topic that will never go out of style, it’s an essential, expository, evergreen topic of interest). and that i will make more videos, improving one thing at a time. one thing at a time. slow steps to progress.

i want to make engaging videos, but it’s really difficult because i don’t think i have a very engaging personality… it’s very “book report”-ish at the moment, lmao, i’d like to be myself. if i know who that person is.

i had a ton of anxiety about how i would be judged or what if i got it entirely wrong… (i rerecorded some parts due to this and i think that may have been a bad decision, because the cuts sound terrible, but anyways). but everyone was so encouraging and just had such a warmhearted reception to it, i don’t think i expected that. i expected mean comments for some reason, idk lol. i also expected way more pushback and cringe because i was talking about sapkowski (who, as we all know, is not very popular, for some reasons more valid than others). so i honestly have no idea where the positivity came from, except your own good souls and goodwill towards me, which is astounding, so thank you.

i want to make more videos and improve. and grow the channel, so it can serve people who are interested in the books. the books deserve something of their own, their own space. i know they’ve had their own space for as long as they’ve existed, but this would be my space for them. if that makes sense. i’m carving out an intentional space for the witcher books, slowly but surely, it will get there with time.

at the same time, i have to balance this with real life. ugh, real life. i might have serious committments this week, but i have no idea... the exact details yet. essentially, committments that may eat up all my time to the point where i’ll have no time for this large crazy video experiment after all.

my name, nimue, is… an emanation of myself. like krzysztof’s katarzyna. a poet’s name.

my person that exists within book pages, the mind, and the web. but not in real life. or rather, not yet in real life. i think they’re stuck somewhere between the screen and the floor.

i’d like to bring them to life, soon. but it will take time, work. i have no idea if i’ll have that kind of time soon. i have no idea what adulthood brings me in terms of commitments. it hurts me to abandon nimue like this. for once, i was able to bargain something for them, release myself, give into the creative flow. i spent a week being them, i think that’s the longest nimue has ever existed in the real world. and now… i have to jump back into my ‘real’ self again. “no fun allowed.” damn it. and i had just tasted that freedom, that creation.

all i know is that i can’t let them die. though i think they’re immortal inside me, after all. and perhaps one day we’ll become the same person. it could happen!

[josiebelladonna]

okay, i officially hate art contests.

you know how yesterday i was saying that ai has cheapened art on pretty much every level possible? well, art contests play a role in that, too. probably a bigger role, tbh, and ai is merely writing its obituary.

i just think of all the contests i’ve ever entered, starting with the science fair in elementary school where my dad and i built a trebuchet together and we all thought that was going to be a slam dunk. our catapult lost out to your stereotypical volcano eruption of cola and mentos. A CATAPULT!

then there was an art contest in middle school, when i entered a cartoon in—i don’t remember what it was exactly but i had drawn a picture full of people in my cartoon style, fresh off the press from the winter before. i lost to the crappiest drawing you’ve ever seen, and i knew there was some favoritism going on there.

then there was soundgarden’s fan art contest in 2016. i entered a drawing of soundgarden themselves into it and i had absolutely no hope for it just from my past experiences. get this: it actually won… but no one on my facebook cared. i think one person liked it, but that was it (this was 2016, too, way before ai came about and ruined everything). the other girl who won got support out the nose. i also hated the prize, too, so figure i distanced myself from the whole thing. what, we put our hard work into this shit and you can’t even be bothered to do better than vinyl records?

then there was chalk on the walk the year before and in 2018. i drew a koi pond in 2015. got bupkis, not even a “thank you”. i drew chris with my heavy metal flowers in 2018. got a bunch of people stopping and taking pictures and asking me questions, but i didn’t even get an honorable mention. i don’t even know who won either year, i don’t even remember them.

i entered my beatles drawings into the state fair in 2018, all four of which i spent hours on. got nothing: i lost to the shittiest drawing of edgar allen poe i had ever seen in my entire life, and i wish i took a picture to show you guys because it really was that godawful.

now here we are with mermay. did all my stuff this year by hand and i’m starting to wonder what the hell is even the point now when it’s obvious they like the clean, digital, disney-ish stuff better. the month isn’t even done yet and i’m starting to feel like a complete idiot for even bothering with it. really, i feel genuinely embarrassed for even attempting it in the first place. i’m just gonna post the remaining ones and then just be done with it, i’m not gonna give a shit about the winners (plus, i’ve been on ig four years now and you’d think, logically, my account has grown by now. fuck me, right?)

i’m thinking of participating in a fashion one for edward gorey’s foundation later this year just to try something different but… now that i write this out, i really, really don’t know and i’m starting to regret even considering it. i have the worst track record with these things and my so-called family and so-called friends wouldn’t give a shit if my life depended on it. i can just see their reactions towards it, too, like “oh, great, here we go again… another contest, another forgone conclusion… get a real job, sweetie”. the people who claim to care about me don’t care at this point. they didn’t care in 2016, and they really don’t care now.

I don’t win contests. i never can, either, simply because of the whole unspoken act of favoritism. you put your heart and soul into a portrait of your dead friend or into four of the four lads from liverpool and you fucking lose to cheapness and amateurness in the worst way possible taken to its dumbest conclusion. they also shortchange artists, too, like the prizes for the chalk on the walk competitions were like gift cards. the soundgarden one had fucking vinyl, not meeting the guys or having a say in the art for the next album or anything awesome like that. just: “here. vinyl”. (worse, they didn’t even tell us what it was until after the fact, so yeah, figure i totally felt used and it left a bad taste in my mouth). because of this, they are very limiting. you can only get away with so much for the sake of the dumbest conclusion you can possibly think of.

art contests are complete bullshit. don’t bother with them if you respect yourself.

[xb-squaredx]

B-Squared's Belated Top 10 Games of 2023

Well, this has come out…a lot later than I wanted to but life gets in the way. 2023 had a lot of fantastic games in it…but sadly I didn’t get to very many of them. So many great games, from the indies to the AAAs and everything in between. As of now I’ve had to be a bit more careful with money and still haven’t gotten my hands on either a beefy PC to play all the new games or a next-gen console, so my options are somewhat limited…which will be reflected in this list. So for anyone asking why Baldur’s Gate 3 or Alan Wake 2 or Spider-Man 2 or anything else isn’t on this list…I had no real means to play it. That said, I still enjoyed the bulk of what I played in 2023, so I figure it’s better late than never to celebrate those games.

#10: F-ZERO 99

F-Zero is a franchise I have limited experience with; I’ve played far more of Captain Falcon in the Smash Bros. series than any other F-Zero game combined. Regardless, the release of a new game after a near 20 year hiatus certainly had my attention. F-Zero 99 is a new take on the original game, after the popularity of Tetris 99 on the Switch. Up to 99 players race together in a battle-royale fashion, aiming to take first place…or at least survive to the finish line. I’ll be up front that I’m terrible at this game and didn’t play that much of it, but I can recognize that it was a fun spin on an old idea, giving players ample ways to try to play catch up in the chaotic, high-speed races, and for those that are more well-versed in F-Zero it served as a way to scratch an itch that has been bugging them for a good long while. Its unclear what the series’ future will be but I’m hopeful that the overall positive reception to this free-to-play title means there might be more to come for F-Zero sometime soon.

#9: ADVANCE WARS 1+2 RE-BOOT CAMP

As long as we’re talking about older, revived Nintendo franchises, we may as well talk about Advance Wars. After Fire Emblem really took off worldwide, this series has been rather dormant over at Intelligence Systems. Due to real world events, this release was delayed by about a year, but I’m glad that the remake of the first two Advance Wars games helmed by Wayforward was able to finally release. Overall, these are very faithful remakes with some great new bits of animation, voice acting and music, with players able to compete in the campaigns or wage war locally or online in the multiplayer modes. Some people weren’t a huge fan of the visual style in this remake, or felt that it could have done more, but ultimately I’m just happy to see this series come back again and I think Wayforward did a great job. The endless horrors of war have never been so fun!

#8: HOLOLIVE FAN GAMES: (HOLOCURE: SAVE THE FANS AND IDOL SHOWDOWN)

You might remember from a while back that I’m a VTuber fan, especially the ones over at Hololive. There’s been a number of really fun fan games that have released over the years but this year we got two of them released that were right up my alley…well, kinda. First off we have Holocure, a “bullet-heaven” game in the same vein as Vampire Survivors starring the Hololive girls. It’s technically still in early-access and has been out for a while…but the STEAM release was in 2023 and that’s when I first played it so it counts. It’s a very fun game with cute pixel art, great remixes of Hololive songs and is filled to bursting with tons of interesting references to these streamers…which makes it almost completely incomprehensible to non-fans, but that’s beside the point.

We also received a Hololive fighting game in Idol Showdown this year, which I also enjoyed for the most part. The character movesets are filled with just as many references, with some very expressive sprite work on both the playable cast and the backgrounds. A rogue like Digital Frontier mode adds to the stuff to do in the game if pure fighting isn’t for you, and it’s even received some free DLC characters as time has gone on. I do wish the game was a bit more optimized in some regards, but it’s otherwise a really fun game that managed to combine two of my interests together into one package. So I’m counting both of these games together under the umbrella of being Hololive fan games. Give them a try….and fall down the rabbit hole.

#7: NICKELODEON ALL STAR BRAWL 2

Speaking of fighting games, I was pleasantly surprised by the reveal and subsequent release of Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2. Despite being excited by the prospect of the first game, I wasn’t all that fond of it by the time it released. It was a barebones experience, devoid of any voice work for these iconic characters (often with iconic voices), looked bad, ran worse at times and most of the cast had very same-y, uninspired movesets. So I’m very happy to say that the sequel is everything the original game should have been.

NASB 2 is a gigantic improvement in every way; it looks a lot better, the voices are here from the get-go now, there’s a huge single player campaign and the cast this time around all feel FAR more fleshed out and distinct. I still have some qualms with the roster overall, but I’m glad the team at Fair Play Labs (and the few members of Ludocity on this project) managed to create something that can appeal to both hardcore platform fighter fans and fans of the Nick characters. Sadly, I think a lot of people felt burned by the last game and didn’t even give this one a try, but trust me…this really is one of the more inventive platform fighters out there. The Slime mechanic itself is kind of worth the price of admission, being able to augment your moves, burst out of combos, or spend on a huge super move to send foes flying. The single player is also filled with fun references and a fair bit of things to do as you fight various minor enemies and bosses from across the various Nick shows. While a bit bug-riddled at launch and my potato PC can barely handle it at times, I had a blast with it, and I hope that people can eventually give this game a chance.

#6: BAYONETTA ORIGINS: CEREZA AND THE LOST DEMON

Oh hey and speaking of burning fans with the last installment and giving things a chance…yeah Bayonetta Origins: Cereza and the Lost Demon was always going to be a tough sell. Even if Bayonetta 3 had been well-received by fans, taking a series known for its over-the-top arcade action and extremely sexual heroine and pivoting to a fairy-tale aesthetic and relatively simple puzzle solving and exploration wasn’t ever going to have a wide appeal. If you don’t like the other Bayonetta games you might end up enjoying this, but then why would you even be looking in this game’s direction? And conversely, if you love the other games, this one is so completely different there’s no guarantee you’d enjoy it. Truly, Bayonetta Origins is a game for an extremely small niche of players, but I was willing to give it a shot and ended up quite enjoying it. In fact, I think it’s one of the best games Platinum has put out in years.

Taking place when young Cereza was still a witch in training, players have to guide Cereza and her first demonic summon, Cheshire, through a maze-like forest infested with dangerous fairies. The game itself feels inspired by something like Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons, alongside Platinum’s own Astral Chain. Players control Cereza and Cheshire simultaneously, using each control stick to guide them through puzzles and the occasional combat encounter. Cereza uses her magic to hold enemies in place or manipulate the environment while Cheshire is in charge of tearing enemies apart. The cel-shaded storybook aesthetic is very charming, making for a game that I think is a lot easier on the eyes than Bayonetta 3, and the coming-of-age element of Cereza learning to stick up for herself and get stronger gave us a fairly well-told story (which is kind of a rarity for this franchise). Outside of a map that isn’t all that helpful, and the fact that it’s still connected to Bayonetta 3 in some strange, confusing ways, this is far and away the best Bayonetta game developed for the Switch, and yeah, I’m just as surprised as you are.

#5: STREET FIGHTER 6

Once upon a time Capcom was considered to be the kings of fighting games, but everything changed when Street Fighter V came out in such a barebones, awful state that the FGC at large moved onto other things. But 2023 was the year Capcom returned to take their crown back, and MAN is Street Fighter 6 a massive return to form. Now, I should stress my time with this game has been limited; I’ve played with a friend with their own copy of the game as well as poured over the PS4 demo, but I don’t actually own this game myself yet. If I DID, this would probably be a bit higher on this list honestly.

SF6 took a long hard look at the complaints levied at the previous game and did everything they could to turn things around here. Rather than launching with no arcade mode and later adding a lackluster story mode, 6 launches with a massive World Tour campaign, giving players the ability to create their own character and dive into the world of Street Fighter in what is ostensibly an action RPG hidden within the greater game. Rather than give us the divisive V-System that encouraged passive play and largely locked away each character’s strongest tools, the Drive System in SF6 gives players tons of way to engage with the game right from round start and encourages both aggression and proper resource management. At high-level, SF6 becomes a tug-of-war between players doing everything they can to whittle down their opponent’s Drive Gauge, while holding onto their own, and then place them into checkmate when they go into Burnout. The game’s new, more realistic artstyle took some time to grow on me personally, but I think they ended up making it work, though admittedly I’m with everyone else in stating that the OST for the game is a bit lacking. Thankfully, they nailed it where it really matters: the roster is filled with some awesome new faces (Marisa my beloved) and manages to make the veteran fighters feel fresh, and the cherry on top is an almost impeccable online experience. I’m glad Capcom learned from their mistakes, and the result is one of the best fighting games around.

#4: FIRE EMBLEM: ENGAGE

Releasing right at the start of the year, I’m sure a lot of people forgot about Fire Emblem Engage, though really I think they’re missing out. I’ve been a fan of the series since Awakening, so the gaps in knowledge with the series is vast, but I could still recognize this as a love letter to the entire series. Clearly intended as a celebration of the franchise’s 30th anniversary before a certain pandemic got in the way, Engage is filled to the brim with fanservice…and not just the sexy kind! Truthfully I do feel aspects of this game are at odds with each other; while the overall presentation is great, being the most colorful and flashy game in the series yet, its story is…let’s say lacking. The characters are all fairly one-note and at times lean way more into stock anime archetypes than fully-fleshed out cast members, especially in comparison to the best parts of Three Houses, and there is the odd….otaku-bait stuff for lack of a better term, especially regarding the romance options, but the actual core gameplay is the best in the series.

Fights are fast, ferocious and give players a ton of great new mechanics to sink their teeth into. The star of the show is obviously the various rings characters can equip, which can summon a ghost of a past Fire Emblem hero to help out, giving you a neat little Stand of sorts to augment your abilities for a short time. Adding to that, players can push enemies away, or even break their guard, preventing them from attacking during your turn. I really enjoyed some of the changes to the core weapon triangles of the series, including a new one with archers, mages and bare-handed fighters. Being able to have my healers lay waste to those units with some fisticuffs never got old. Engage might not be the most ambitious game in the series, but at the same time it was a fantastic celebration of how far this series has come and how much more life it still has in it yet. Alear’s hair is still kinda dumb though…

#3: THE LEGEND OF ZELDA: TEARS OF THE KINGDOM

Years ago Breath of the Wild not only launched the Switch into immediate sales success, but also started a conversation about how to craft an interesting open world game after years of the genre feeling overdone. And now in the twilight years of the Switch, Tears of the Kingdom returns to that same world with some new tricks. Link’s new abilities give players even more options for engaging in that world, and many of them are true technical marvels. I’ve gone over a lot of this game in a separate blog post, so I won’t try to reiterate what I said there too much, but ultimately I just enjoyed getting to bounce around a familiar world with even more freedom and opportunities to mess around and see how things worked.

I’d argue that TOTK has more in common with a big old box of random Lego pieces than a game at times. Half the fun is reaching inside and seeing what I can create when mixing and matching things together. Using Link’s Ultrahand and Fusion abilities I can craft vehicles and weapons that are often very goofy and don’t always work right…but when you land on something that’s just crazy enough to work it’s magical. In addition to the massive world from BOTW we also have islands in the sky to investigate, alongside the mysterious Depths, so there was always something to poke at and do. You get into a pretty solid gameplay loop of using the sky islands to look for areas of interest down below, then messing around on the ground during quests and visiting towns, before traveling into the Depths to harvest ore that goes towards making a variety of vehicles that can help me get around elsewhere, especially when it comes to getting back into the sky. Your options start out limited, but as you play you get more and more tools to work with and your various mechanisms become that much more complex. This even gets reflected in some of the dungeons you investigate, with one in the Depths in particular being such a programming flex, tons of game developers on Twitter were losing it, just wondering how Nintendo made it happen. For as much as we tout graphical upgrades as true progress in games, Nintendo is doing more interesting things with the very innards of a game using a console that was already out of date when it launched, and that needs to be championed.

For as much time as I poured into this game (probably somewhere close to 200 hours), I’d be lying if I said I enjoyed all of it. With that amount of playtime, you’re bound to notice some cracks. While this game definitely amplified everything I loved about BOTW, it also failed to really address many of the concerns people had with the previous game. Fusion as a mechanic makes ALL weapons feel usable to a degree, but the constant breaking is even MORE frequent. While there IS a way to stop slipping on wet surfaces, it requires a TON of time investment and the potions that give you slip resistance feel like a bandage over the whole annoyance. And then there’s the story being…very repetitive and a bit too much like the previous game in ways. I can see why talk of this game kind of dried up faster compared to BOTW; there was both a lot more competition this year, but also a lot of this game felt too derivative and lost that novelty of the original game. I wouldn’t have poured over 200 hours into the game if I didn’t love it, but there was definitely enough there to hold it back from being my favorite experience of the year.

#2: XENOBLADE CHRONICLES 3: FUTURE REDEEMED

Xenoblade Chronicles 3 was my GOTY last year, and I knew that a beefy DLC campaign was still in the chamber. I was looking forward to Future Redeemed, but it exceeded about all of my expectations. While the core Xenoblade games have their connections, they’ve all been relatively standalone experiences on the whole until now. I had remembered going into Xenoblade 3, curious to see how all of these elements from the first two games would come together, but that game’s story leaned far more on the brand new cast rather than touching on the older characters in the series and I was left with a lack of closure. I should have had more faith in Monolith Soft, as Future Redeemed serves as not just a prequel to the story in Xenoblade 3, but as the glue that ties the entire Xenoblade series together.

Similar to Xenoblade 2’s Torna: The Golden Country DLC campaign, Future Redeemed is about the size of a medium-sized RPG in its own right, even if it never got a standalone release like Torna did. It keeps a lot of the same core systems of the base game here, but with some interesting twists. Whereas base game Xenoblade 3 made use of a class system and the ability for allies to fuse together, Future Redeemed emphasized pairing up different characters so they could cover for each other’s weaknesses or add to their strengths, on top of having some flashy combination attacks. There was a ton of things to do on the world map at any moment, with Monolith Soft making great use of a more limited map compared to the base game. Seriously, grind rails that can go up AND down were about the one thing Xenoblade 3 really needed! There was also just…so much fanservice and real love for this series found throughout. Seeing Shulk and Rex, the protagonists of the past entries, interacting with each other was fantastic, and newcomer Matthew was a great lead in his own right.

Longtime fans of Monolith Soft CEO and overall creator of the Xenoblade series, Tetsuya Takahashi, will know that his vision of a complete story has been a difficult one to see to completion. Starting back with Xenogears and later Xenosaga, it’s here that Xenoblade finally managed to have a satisfying multi-game arc and conclusion that finally answered some burning questions I had from the ending of 3. Somehow Future Redeemed managed to bring it all together in ways that longtime fans had always hoped for, and all in a neat 30-ish hour package. While I had greatly enjoyed Xenoblade 3, it was still missing something and Future Redeemed was that final piece, making me feel really valued as a longtime fan in the series, and also seems to have some nods to fans of the overarching “Xeno metaseries” that makes me extremely interested in seeing just where Takahashi’s Wild Ride takes us. If this DLC was an indication, the future is indeed bright.

#1: SUPER MARIO BROS. WONDER

As long as we’re talking of bright futures…boy is it good to be a Mario fan right now. From a billion dollar box office hit, to remakes of two beloved RPG spinoffs, that alone would have satisfied fans of the plumber, but then we got hit with the first wholly original 2D Mario in almost two decades. While the New Super Mario Bros. games were all mostly well-regarded critically and commercially, they were just as often considered kind of stale. Inoffensive, but not very interesting, and with so many pumped out in such a short time, it was felt that Mario’s 2D outings had lost something. With the Super Mario Maker games, many had felt that Nintendo had done all that they could with the formula and left it in the hands of fans…but boy were we wrong.

Super Mario Bros. Wonder is oozing creativity out of every pore. From the stylish art direction that calls back to the older 2D art from the NES and SNES days, to the focus on music found throughout the game, it’s a rare game that made me smile about the whole way through. So much here feels fresh and different, from the litany of brand new enemies and power ups, to the various Wonder effects that often cap off levels and take them off the rails. I’ve gushed about this game enough in a separate blog post, which you can read here, but ultimately it has to be said that Wonder is a fantastic experience from moment to moment.

Not every game needs to be revolutionary or create a whole new industry standard to be recognized as great. Sometimes it just needs to be really fun. But even so, the amount of care that went into Wonder deserves praise. The developers weren’t given a deadline at first and got to really explore ideas before nailing things down. To see so much of the original Mario crew still involved on this project after so many years in the industry also showcases Nintendo’s iterative design that is continually polished to a fine sheen. The simple act of moving around is so smooth and responsive, the level design constantly plays with your expectations and makes hunting for secrets such a blast, and many of the new mechanics are slotted in seamlessly, like they were always there. Why yes, giving Mario a grappling hook makes perfect sense! Of COURSE he can turn into an elephant and put out fires with water shot out of the trunk! Some dislike the changes to multiplayer, no longer having any collision or ways to really screw with other players, but that results in seamless online play that lets players experience the levels together, yet apart, in a way I haven’t seen many other games implement. Being able to guide newer players through levels by giving them hints, or even a power up if they need it, and throwing down a standee sign that can revive them even if I’m not there…it’s really something special, akin to how players of Journey felt back in the day. The one blemish on what is otherwise a perfect experience are the boss fights that are both too few and too same-y, but honestly that’s a nitpick in the grand scheme of things. So yeah, Super Mario Bros. Wonder is the game that probably gave me the most joy this year. Not the longest game or the most technically impressive, but a masterclass in design that deserves every bit of praise.

CONCLUSION

There are tons of games I wish I got to this year. I’m sure this list would look a LOT different if I had a beefier PC to check out certain games with, or a fancy new PS5, but that wasn’t in the cards this year. If anything though that just goes to show how many talented people are in this industry that there are so many finely-crafted experiences, so many ambitious titles that keep pushing the medium forward. It was admittedly a lighter year for Nintendo, which has always been my bias, but I’m glad to see the folks over at Remedy and Larian and so many others pushing the boundaries of what we can expect to see in games. Having a virtual D&D campaign filled with moments where you have to adapt to things on the fly is nothing short of a magical experience, and seeing how Alan Wake 2 fuses together film and video game to create something so unique deserves its roses as well. Ultimately though, this was a year filled with some developers running on all cylinders, truly excelling at their craft. We’re getting fighting games with honest-to-God single player content! Strategy games are alive and well and continue to tease and torment players with tough decisions. All the while smaller developers pump passion into their projects, resulting in some fantastic experiences all their own. It was a good year for games and I look forward to seeing what will make my list next year. Until next time.

-B

[omgreally]

I’ve been reading mandos intergalactic taxi service and UGH✨💕 the pining and fluff with the intimacy smut is just chefs kiss your writing style is amazing🤌🏽✨ I’ve been in such a Din mood lately, could your write like a confession drabble where the reader and din are pining for each other and din is dropping hints but the reader is like really not a hint taker lol pretty please with a cherry on top 😭💕 smut or fluff your choice I know you’d write it so well!!

BLESS YOUR HEART @liltangerineart and thank you! Next chapter of Taxi Service should be up tomorrow I hope!

In the meantime I hope you like this? Not a confession as such and more, uh, top!Mando than I intended, but he is bad at dropping hints. I like to think he would be very...straightforward 😎

Din Djarin/F!Reader - E - 1624 words - Oblivious!Reader, Infatuated!Din, frustrated yearning, angst and, of course, smut.

It's getting ridiculous.

He is a Mandalorian, one of the most fabled, the most feared warriors in the galaxy. Rumour and danger follow him as he charts a path through the galaxy that blazes bright, leaving behind myth and legend - people whispering things like 'I heard he killed a whole troop with his hands tied' and 'I heard he was eight feet tall, made of steel'.

He is a Mandalorian, who has never had to rely on anybody but himself - and yet here he is, sweating beneath his cowl whenever you brush too close, trying too hard to inhale the scent of you through his helmet's filters, memorizing the sound of your laugh.

It's like he's a foundling again - uncertain, insecure, nervous. And they’re not butterflies in the pit of his stomach - they’re bullets from an ancient slugthrower weapon, and he can taste metal at the back of his tongue whenever he tries to talk to you.

“Do you have someone, back home?” A clumsy overture, as obvious as it is stupid; Din winces beneath the helm but you don’t seem to notice - you just shake your head and shrug.

“No. Just me. I wouldn’t have left otherwise.” Loyal, he thinks, and the bullets in his stomach sting just that little bit harder.

He tries asking you more about yourself. How you became a bounty hunter. How many weapons you’ve handled. The different kinds of ships you’ve flown. Places you’ve been. But you never give up anything truly personal about yourself - you’re a cypher.

Maybe that’s why the Mandalorian finds himself strangely drawn to you.

He doesn’t know how to navigate this - not really. He has no experience with this kind of thing. It’s always been about the next quarry, the next job, and then it was about the kid, and now…

And now he’s stuck.

He wants to hit something, break something, feel the impact of his fists against flesh and bone. He settles for balling them up whenever you’re around, biting his tongue, and waiting til later to jerk himself off in pathetic, clench-jawed silence in the refresher.

“You slept late,” you point out the next morning as he emerges, stiff in more than one way, from his bunk.

“Couldn’t sleep last night,” he says, and he’s so tired, so frustrated that he adds, gruffly: “Bed was too empty.”

“Probably need more pillows,” you muse as you wander off to the kitchenette. “Cup of caf?”

“Extra strong,” he grunts as he leans a shoulder to the wall, and you’re oblivious to his glower.

“Coming right up.” A minute later, you press a mug into his hand. “I’ll leave you to it. No need to go hide, I’ll go find a bulkhead to look at while you take your helmet off.”

You grin at him, and he stares at you. You’re just about to turn away when he reaches up, and you go still, your smile slackening in shock as he thumbs the release latch under his chin.

The helm’s pneumatic seal hisses as it lifts, just enough so he can get the rim of his mug up and to his lips. He takes a long, slow pull, and while his vision is eclipsed by the rim of the helmet at the moment, he knows you haven’t left.

As he expects, you’re still there - staring at him as he lowers his helm back into place. Your mouth is even slightly open - lips parted - and he watches the dart of your tongue as you wet them before swallowing hard.

“I’m just...I’m just gonna,” you say, abortingly, and start to back away. You jump as your shoulder hits the hatchway. Din watches as you turn, hesitate, then hurry away, your shoulders squared defensively as if you can feel the force of his gaze on your back.

Alone, the taste of caf hot and bitter on his tongue, Din Djarin grins.

After that, he starts to notice. He starts to notice how tense you are when he’s close.

At first he’s not sure - but then, once, he deliberately brushes your waist as he moves past you in the cockpit to take the pilot’s seat, and you’re still standing there, frozen, when he glances back at you. You brush it off, but it happens again when you bump into him coming out of the fresher. When he reaches over your head in the kitchenette to fetch a ration bar from a compartment. When you lean over his shoulder to point out the coordinates to a refueling station. When he catches you yawning, falling asleep in the passenger’s seat.

“I’m going to hit my bunk,” you say, rising to your feet, your arms stretched above your head. Din turns slowly, and he catches the glimpse of a sliver of flesh as your shirt rides up. The words escape him before he’s even conscious of their existence.

“Want some company?”

Dank farrik, he’s been dropping hints and touches for ages - and he knows you’re affected by his presence, he’s sure of it now. They might be closer to butterflies for you, but his bullets are bouncing around in his gut right now.

“What?” you ask, half-laughing - as if it’s all some grand joke. “You gotta stop with the innuendo, Mando. I might get the wrong idea.”

“And if it’s not innuendo?” He’s flicked the ship to auto-pilot - on his feet - looming towards you. You’re caught in the hatchway, unable to step backwards to fall down the ladder, unwilling to turn your back. "If you've got the right idea?"

“What?” you repeat - licking your lips again. Your eyes are flicking back and forth from his visor to his hands. It’s almost like you're expecting a fight.

“I want to fuck you.”

The words are matter-of-fact but delivered in a low baritone, a gravelly rasp that lifts the hairs on the back of your neck. You stop breathing for a second - he can see it - and your leg twitches, just half a step backward - but then you swing it forward again, swaying towards him. Like he has you in his gravitational pull.

It’s all Din needs. He closes the distance between you, his gloved hands closing around your biceps, the leather worn and warm through your shirt.

He says your name, once, in a digital growl that curls your toes in your boots. And then it’s like an explosion - it all happens so quickly; there are hands and clothes everywhere and then on the deck, and in the aftermath you are in the Mandalorian’s arms, naked, your legs around his waist as he presses you up against the bulkhead.

His chestplate hits the deck - his flak jacket lifted above his head when you let him stop touching you long enough. You barely have time to appreciate the feel of his naked hands on your skin, cupping your breasts in his broad, smooth palms, thumbing your nipples all-too-briefly before he’s sliding down the zipper of his flight suit and baring a V of muscled flesh all the way to his groin.

“Mando,” you gasp as he frees his cock, as he maneuvers the throbbing, purpled head to drag through your slit. He finds you open and wet, lips parted for him, and he groans as he nudges against your fluttering hole. He doesn't hesitate.

He pushes in slow, for he’s a lot to take, thick and hard and the stretch is almost too much. You whine, your voice high and tight in your throat, and he soothes you with soft little noises and praise that makes you feel light-headed.

“Shhh, that’s it,” “You’re so fucking tight-” “Made to take my cock, mesh’la" and other words you don’t recognize. Eventually, he’s all the way inside you, his pelvis flush to yours, the scratch of hair at his pubic bone pressing into your mound.

You pant in his arms, eyes squeezed shut, a thin resin of sweat risen on your brow. “Move,” you order through clenched teeth, and finally you open your eyes to meet his visor and demand, “Fuck me, Mando.”

And he does - withdrawing his hips from the welcoming cradle of yours, his cock dragging back through you, and you can feel every ridge and vein before he’s spearing back in, jarring your back against the bulkhead. It’s a shock right through your system, and you can feel adrenaline flooding your veins, your blood pumping faster like you’re fighting for your life. You might as well be, for he does it again, and again, and soon he’s setting a punishing pace that hits against something soft and devastating deep inside you.

Your orgasm hits you like a blow you fail to dodge - winding you, knocking the air from your lungs - and for a moment all that matters is the blinding flash of pleasure through your nerves, the rolling wave that makes your cunt flutter in rippling spasms around the pulsing rod of his cock. He pins your hips with another vicious rut of his hips and then he’s coming, too, releasing into the impossible grip of your body, groaning with every spurt of spend he fills you with.

“Fuck,” Din summarizes, once you both can catch your breath - once your legs start to loosen, jelly-weak as he pulls out gently, lowering your feet back to the ground. He’s suddenly nervous - worried he’s fucked this up, done the wrong thing, lost patience and paid for it with your scorn.

But your smile is brilliant as you beam up at him - your face radiant - flushed and sweaty. You are beautiful.

“Next time, don't waste time dropping hints,” you tell him, and then you reassure him with a laugh, and the wonderful feeling of your arms around his neck.

For a while, he just holds you close. And for a while, the bullets in his stomach are gone.

[hwrryscherry]

HARRY x MODEL Y/N  facts part.1

HARRYxMODELY/N masterlist is here.

Credits: The middle manip on this edit picture (the one with Harry’s yellow suit) was made by the beautiful @/94sbells.

Author’s note: HEY GUYS! I know that I’ve been kinda gone lately, but I have reasons for that. My summer vacation ended, and I had to go back to school. We’re still studying online, but I had to take a diagnostic test this past week so they’d know how’s my scholarity level. So, because of all the studying and trying to keep up on a new school (yes, I moved from schools.), I didn’t have any time to write or finish my writings. I’ll try finishing a request today because I’m feeling super creative and nostalgic BUT to everyone who follows HARRYxMODELY/N series, like it and miss it, I just did this ‘’facts-timeline’’ in a hope to feed you guys lol. Anyway, this is like a time line of 2017 and how their relationship developed on that year. I plan on doing one for each year till 2020 and post it on the break between posting the requests. Anyway, I hope you enjoy it and maybe discover things about them that you didn’t know yet. Love you all and thank you for the support and love! TPWK and remember that you’re so golden.

The first ever communication between them was on May 12th, 2017(Model Y’N’s 20th birthday) AND the realesing of HS1 album.

She sent a DM to him on instagram congratulating him by saying she loved the album and wished him all the success.

No, they didn’t know each other and she honestly thought that he’d never answer to her.

After a few hours, Harry answered to her message and she freaked out but never answered back because she didn’t want to bother him.

They officialy met on November 28th, 2017 when Harry performed on Victoria Secrets Fashion Show that occured in Shanghai, China.

It was the first time that Model Y/N ever walked for Victoria Secrets.

She walked the Goddesses segment while Harry sang ‘’Only Angel’’.

Harry literally got on his knees when she walked past him.

He likes to describe his emotion at that moment as “mesmerized”.

Even though she knew that VS models and the singers are supposed to flirt a little on stage to create a teasing sensation, she was so surprised by his actions.

After the show was done, Harry wasn’t going to attend the VS after party but decided to attend last minute because he wanted to know her.

He approached her very calmly and gentle and invited her to ‘’hang out’’ with him and his band through Shanghai as he was going to leave on the next day to complete his tour.

She asked Bella to go with her because she didn’t want to hang out with him and his bandmates alone as they didn’t know each other.

But she did felt a huge connection between them almost immidiately.

Through Shanghai, Harry was hitting on her the ENTIRE time! He was complimenting, being super nice, and flirting as well but she honestly thought he was just being nice.

Harry thought for a while that she was playing it hard to get until he realized that she wasn’t.

They spent the whole night going through Shanghai.

They went to Nanjing Road and walked around seeing the lights.

They bought those film cameras and took the funniest pictures ever. They still have those films but never digitalized it to the computer.

They went to all those mini bars and had a few drinks while eating chinese food.

Btw, Harry and Model Y/N LOVE chinese food.

They were on the same hotel.

They didn’t go back yet but plan to do so when quarantine is over.

When it was about 8am, they came back to their hotel.

They both agreed that they would come back to Shanghai one day to go to disneyland.

So Harry went back to his tour and Model Y/N went back to NYC.

On the night out in Shanghai they exchanged numbers because Bella Hadid(Model Y/N’s bff)noticed that Harry was interested on Model Y/N, so she casually told them that they should get each other’s number.

The media was crazy about them. First it was the VS move and then there was tons of paps photos of them out in Shanghai.

The media was trying to sell the story as if they were already dating before the VS, which wasn’t true.

They talked for months as friends because of the number exchange.

They talked via texts, calls and face time all the time but it wasn’t anything more than friendship to her.

Model Y/N and some friends of her was planning on traveling to Ibiza, Spain to celebrate New Year’s Eve and as she and Harry were getting really close to each other she invited him and told him that he could take whoever he wanted.

Of course she thought he was cute and had a small crush but nothing extreme.

Harry did invited her for some of his shows but she couldn’t attend any of it.

That made Harry think that she didn’t like him.

She thought he was going to take a girlfriend.

Harry took Gemma and her boyfriend to the trip with him.

Yes, their whole group of friends were there as well but midia acted like there was only them in it.

They were in Ibiza from December 28th, 2017 to January 3rd, 2018.

The group of friends that was in Ibiza with them included Bella Hadid, Fai Khadra, Imaan Hammam, Grace Elizabeth, Gemma Styles, Machine Gun Kelly, Model Y/N’s brother, etc.

And yes, there were TONS of paps in Ibiza following them because the media was selling the whole ‘’Harry Styles’s new girlfriend’s thing.“

Harry is super private about relationships and Model Y/N had ended a serious relationship early that year so they just didn’t address any rumors because they didn’t care about what the media said.

They “saw” each other as friends and that was what mattered.

It was probably the most random group of friends that she ever traveled with, but it was fun on the same way.

They had a really cool and funny vibe, and it was really easy to everyone to get along.

When fans noticed that Y/N’s friends were following Harry on social media they really thought all the rumors were real.

Their house was really close to the beach, so you could actually see it by Harry’s bedroom barricade.

They usually went to the beach or stayed by the pool during the day and went out at night.

Honestly, they used to come home from the nightlife of Ibiza at 3/4am.

They’d wake up after noon for sure.

Harry wouldn’t eat his breakfast until Model Y/N’s woken up.

He’d cook an avocado toast sandwich to her every morning and wait for her to wake up.

He’d do it because on one of their late night talks, she had told him that she loved it so much.

They’d eat at the barricade while watching the beach.

Model Y/N HAD always been obsessed with Harry’s hair and she’d tell him that he needed to moisturize his hair as they were under the sun all the time.

It was just an excuse to touch his hair.

So they’d exchange it. She’d put oil on his hair, and he’d put on hers.

If they had to go to the beach, Harry would convince her to do the craziest things like fly board flying, going on jetskis together and those things.

He was the only one to convince her to do it because she is TERRIFIED of swimming in the ocean.

They’d all go out for lunch on some restaurants and after going shopping before the sunset.

Harry would always come to her saying like “oh, this would look good in you” whenever he saw a piece of cloth that he liked.

Some fans would post pics of them on social media only making the rumors go hard.

Then one fan would post that met up with them and they said they’re just friends, which was true at that time.

Back at the house, they’d get ready to enjoy the Ibiza nightlife.

They’d dress a little better and go out to some bar or club.

Do you know those videos of Harry dancing in Anguilla? It would be the same vibe. Harry and Model Y/N would vibe so hard to the songs, and dance and shout and sing. It would be really funny.

Model Y/N used to go to his room at 4 am when they came back from the street because they usually sit by the barricade and talked for hours.

They’d talk about all the things that mattered to them, like: career, fashion, music, video, paintings, friends, family, how fame changed their lives.

They’d laugh about all the dating rumors as well, but it would be that type of laugh like “lol I wished it was true.”

They’d tell each other dad jokes and stories about their lives and experiences until the sunrise.

By the afternoon of December 31st, 2017, they were all talking about their new year’s kiss and they decided that Harry and Y/N would be one of the pairs to kiss.

Model Y/N agreed but it was more of a joke to her than a real kiss; she didn’t take it seriously.

They all got ready to celebrate NYE on the beach.

On the next day there were tons of videos of them dancing on the beach and them with fans as well.

When the New Year came, they had their first kiss and of course that changed everything.

Both of them felt sparkles and by the effect of a few drinks that both of them had on that night, they did share some other kisses here and there on that night.

For a miracle, no one captured them kissing on camera.

FACTS OF HARRY & MODEL Y/N’S RELATIONSHIP THROUGH 2018 WILL BE CONTINUED ON THE NEXT POST.

[naamahdarling]

For the ask deluge: what are some podcasts you're into? Have you checked out 'Unwell' at all? I highly recommend it if not, especially if you liked TMA!

Ooooohhhh, I will 100% check that one out, thank you!  It sounds like something we’d enjoy!

We just started Old Gods of Appalachia and it’s got me having all kinds of Large Feelings, no small part of which is just blazing, white-hot envy at the quality of the prose and how I didn’t write it. SO good.

The Penumbra Podcast is probably my second fave behind Magnus Archives. I love Juno Steel, I relate to him a lot more than I probably should. I haven’t listened to the latest season because I love it so much I’m literally afraid to listen to it because what if it goes badly for them and Juno and Peter are never together the way they SHOULD BE?!

I liked Spines, a horror/sci-fi/weird podcast.  it was incredibly moving at the end.

I liked The White Vault. I can’t take David Ault seriously, but I do enjoy him, and the other VAs were excellent.

Welcome to Night Vale, obviously, is nice, but I am YEARS behind.

Limetown is one of the best horror/sci fi podcasts I’ve ever listened to, it’s an extraordinary work of fiction, and I highly recommend it.  No idea if the TV series thing they did was any good.

Point Mystic is SO cool and nobody has heard of it? Give the first season a listen, it’s like a weird Stephen King horror novel with kid protagonists, only told from the point of view of the adults. It’s really cool.

I LOVED The Black Tapes until it flubbed the last season with what felt like really rushed and inattentive writing and fouled up the ending in a huge way. Still mad! Still REAL MAD over here!  I need to look and see if anyone’s done any good fix-it fic and actually written a final season that works.

I LOVE Sawbones! So much! Sydnee is the absolute best, and I have learned so much. Their COVID coverage has been extraordinary. Like, they saw the chance to become science communicators for the pandemic to their audience and they went with it, and I am so grateful that they’ve turned over so much of their show to it even though it cuts into the “fun” factor. I think they’ve done a lot to help demystify and explain what’s going on in an accessible, respectful, honest way, and I am very proud of them.

The Feast is really neat, if you’re into food and history.

I love Lore, I love Cabinet of Curiosities, I love Unobscured.  We’ve been with Lore since the single digit episodes, and seeing Aaron build his brand like this has been incredible and inspirational, and I love his narrative style.

Unexplained is a great podcast for weird occurrences and true crime. I love the narrator’s voice to pieces but it puts my GF to sleep because he’s so pleasant. His trio of Season 3 episodes on Jack Parsons, the rocket scientist and ritual magician, were so good I’ve listened to them like four times. (But I find Parsons really interesting.)

Man in the Window, about the Golden State Killer, is...honestly spectacular and important, and I highly recommend it to everyone.

Morbid is enjoyable true crime and I personally love it because I also am a chaotic disaster much like the hostesses, but it’s not for everyone. If you want a more sedate, narrative, scripted podcast, you should skip Morbid. Mostly I love the Listener Tales episodes and hope that some of my experiences will appear on there someday, once I’ve sent them in.

Unresolved is consistently good for true crime. The narrator is not a professional radio voice type, he sounds like someone’s nephew, but he puts a lot into it, and I live for the times he very calmly swears up a blue streak about terrible people and societal injustice. It’s like hearing the school librarian swearing at someone.

Someone Knows Something is a must-listen. All seasons. It’s investigative, covering cold cases, and it’s just really fucking good.  Actually, every single true crime podcast from CBC has been stellar, please look into them.

Just started True North True Crime and Red Flags, both of which are really good so far.

And finally, The Bilbcast, which is just the creator’s cat Bilbo purring. It’s really good, just so good, because Bilbo is a very good boy.

[phoenotopia]

The Last Phoenotopia Blog Update

(Date 2021 MAR 01)

I debated how to open this blog post, but perhaps the main crux of this blog post is the best place to start. The blog is being retired.

The purpose of this blog was to be a "development" blog for Phoenotopia, and well, Phoenotopia's development is done. I'll still be doing bug fixes and maintenance on the PC and Switch versions, and playstation and xbox ports are underway (by a publisher). But I'm not going to be making any more major changes to the game. At some point, you put the paintbrush down and say it's done. Blemishes and all.

Recent Events

The game launched on Steam last month, and like any launch, it was hectic. Bugs Galore. This is our first commercial PC launch, so it was a real baptism by fire. Unlike Switch's one configuration, the PC has multiple configurations and factors to account for. The game needed to be able to handle multiple control schemes, screen resolutions, refresh rates, and more! I had a 60Hz monitor going into launch and didn't know anything about Hz (I do now). There was a troublesome stutter that some players were sensitive to that my whole team didn't notice since our eyes compensated it away. There were a few times where in fixing something at one party's behest, it introduced problems for another party. A few times, due to disorganization, I unwittingly rolled back a fix that was meant to be applied. For some, the game couldn't play at all (really glad Steam allows refunds).

It was messy. It was tiring. I.AM.BEAT.

I think the worst of it is over... I'll still be around to do the last updates and bug fixes, but I'm ultimately ready for what's next.

SO what is next?

What isn't next... is Phoenotopia 2. As you may have heard down the grapevine, the game couldn't be what you call successful. No one's earned even minimum wage on it.

Maybe there's hope in the game's long tail. A year or two down the line... maybe. I won't hold my breath though. At some point in the past few months, I finished processing (or grieving) and it's time to move on.

The game has at least earned enough for us to continue our modest operations. As long as we don't expand the team, and we don't take another monster six-year dev cycle like what Phoenotopia took, we can continue. We'll have to be smarter and faster. Perhaps the most valuable thing we gained from all this is experience.

The Experience

It is a dev blog. Here are some of the lessons I've accumulated from this game's development.

- Have a good menu design. Menus aren't just that in-between fluff before you get to the good stuff. Menus are KEY. Your menus need to be robust, expandable, and *understandable* (to you, the developer). Because once the game's out, you will invariably be asked to add more options. And if your menu design is bad, every time you have to add a new menu option, it becomes a whole new pain all over again. Support mouse from the get-go, etc.

- Focus on features that people will actually care about. For instance, I've never seen anyone praise the camera's zoom feature. In practice, people try that feature a few times and then never use it again. But that feature was a constant consideration factor for every level. Run through it multiple times to make sure the level didn't break, think about which zoom levels made sense, resize rooms because they worked at one zoom level but not the other, and so on.

- Don't do boxes that you can move around. Other 2D platformers avoid movable boxes because they're a huge headache to program and they really complicate the game space. Enemies need to respond to boxes you throw in their path and either navigate around or attack it. When you're moving the box, you have to worry about constantly changing your collision size and reconciling when the box gets snagged on the environment. The boxes were also a constant source of bugs because people can manipulate them to soft-lock themselves and more.

- More focused script. Phoenotopia's 100,000+ word script was panned more for being bloated than it was praised for being lengthy. Long scripts take a long time to write and make the game more unwieldy, increasing the costs of translation and upkeep. Every update we're addressing some textual error or mistranslation. There are some highly renowned games (e.g. Hyper Light Drifter) that do without a script at all!

- Be flashy! A bat and a lightsaber take the same amount of work to program, but the lightsaber will draw a lot more attention and interest.

- Slopes, surprisingly! Six years ago when I started, Unity was ill-equipped for 2D games. If you used the physics that Unity provided you'd have a really floaty character that wouldn't adhere to the slope when going downhill. There were a hundred different tutorials saying different things (use forces, use move position, use translation, etc). You can get rectangular collisions done in a day, but to do slopes took weeks. Meanwhile, games can actually get by fine without slopes. Most people won't even notice. Did you know the Phoenotopia flash game didn't have slopes? Neither does Hollow Knight or Rogue Legacy. You can save yourself a lot of work by avoiding slopes.

(big entities look weird on slopes. Bad slope!)

I could write enough little knowledge nuggets like this to fill a book! But I'd rather just make the next game. 

So… what IS next?

As mentioned previously, it's not Phoenotopia 2. Pirate and I are mostly just tossing some ideas back and forth right now. We'll go silent for a year (or two). Our next game's scope will be more modest in some ways, more ambitious in others. It will definitely be more smartly designed. (There will be a map!)

We'll announce it when it's ready for the public. It might be necessary for us to do a kickstarter. I've tried to avoid kickstarters having been burnt on quite a few myself and also because I worry that mismanaging a kickstarter would earn the ire of backers.

But I did keep this blog regularly updated for six years. So I've gained some confidence in my abilities to at least manage a kickstarter well.

Is it really the last Phoenotopia Blog update though?

Okay, not really. There is some news that I'll need to announce, and this blog is one of the game's main outreach channels. Here are the events that will cause me to update the blog:

Announcing the launch of the xbox/playstation ports when they're ready

If a physical edition of the game happens

If a new language is getting introduced into the game (Korean is a high possibility)

When we're ready to talk about our next game

If (BIG IF) we begin development on a Phoenotopia sequel. I do want to do a sequel one day if we have the means and the demand is there. 

Those updates will be more on a "when they happen" basis, rather than me reporting in every couple months.

Fan Art

As always, I'm very happy to see fanart of Phoenotopia. Major thanks again to Pimez for collecting all the artwork from the corners of the internet! Since this is the "last" blogpost, Sir Pimez can finally take a rest from collecting the fanart :P

ÆV made a series of pictures that tell a story. A Pooki is humanely sheared of its wool to create a hat. The Pooki is unharmed. Nice! Gotta love Gail’s expressions.

Amagoo Mazeru makes a stunning landscape shot of a full moon and shooting stars. It’s a sharp and clear vector art. I like the faint glow of the moon and the fire and the subtle gradient in the night sky. Very skillfully done!

Hah hah. I got a chuckle out of this one. I imagine this is how Gail's enemies see her by the end of the game. CaESar made this image based on TerminalMontage's famous youtube videos. Nailed it!

CrownStar drew two pictures of Gail. I'm a big player of JRPGs, so the first shot instantly reminded me of Persona 4's art style. (Hmmm... Phoeonotopia as a JRPG... there’s potential there...) Next, Birdy is shown carried off after her defeat. I really like Birdy's expression here - she just seems mildly uncomfortable.

There's a bit of a story behind the first image. As Firanka shares it, she wasn't able to defeat the Big Eye monster at the end of the flash game, so she believed a tall tale that what awaited after was a 6 armed Kobold boss. Hilarious! The second is a rendition of the lonely Anuri elder. A rare subject. The loneliness is portrayed well here. I feel lonely just looking at it!

Koo_chop draws the clash between Gail and Katash at the top of the towers. I really like this interpretation of the game's art style. It’s faithful to the in-game graphics. And the lighting, from the glow of Gail's bat, to Katash's sword, and the lightning in the background... Amazing!

Lime Hazard shows Gail with a salute pose. Very appropriate for this occasion. I also like how there's a slight tilt in the angle that Gail is portrayed. Those dynamic angles are always hard to get right, and Lime Hazard pulled it off very skillfully. See you next mission!

Lyoung0J with a digital painting of Gail posed sitting on a rock. I like how it almost seems like she was caught in a candid moment - she’s smiling, but also feeling self-conscious. Cute! The art style really pops, and I like how Gail is sporting what I call the old anime style nose. 

MyUesrNameIsSh*t with a sketch of Gail performing a skillful slingshot. I like how Gail is depicted with her tongue out in a mischievous manner, the way all mischievous people with slingshots do.

Niitsu Kentaro returns with a 2021 Happy New Year picture. That happened didn't it? A New Year... Gail's pose gave me a chuckle with how she seems to be waving the bat around as casually as one would wave hello. And "Phoenotopiyear"... Well said! One day we'll have our Phoenotopiyear...

Ochan Nu breaks all records with a stunning NINE pictures in one session :O

There's so many goodies here. My favorite would be the one with Gail staring intently at the screen - it's like she's looking directly at you. You almost feel uncomfortable.

Next, there's an Animal Crossing villager dressed as Gail and sporting her pink hair. It even looks like a house Gail would live in. Gail is a connoisseur of the arts and likes Mona Lisa. Yes :)

There are various comics of Gail pointing out Gail's weird food habits. A picture of Fran looking really cool, and even Gail rocking a bathing suit. (bathing suit image linked here in case NSFW). Wow!

Pimez didn't just collect the arts, he creates them as well! This one, which he aptly named 'The Year 175' is a depiction of when the dragons invaded the towers as told by an elderly Daean woman. Great pixeling skills! I got a good chuckle from the ice dragon leaving with its stuff slung over its shoulder.

Quo made a stunning picture of Gail playing the flute surrounded by the 5 musical notes and the Phoenix logo behind her. The theme seems to be "fire" and it works really well. Gail herself looks awesome depicted in her red suit - it's like she's leading a marching band!

Rai Asuha depicts Gail in the late game with her red suit, and night star bat, and holding a lamp. She looks ready for adventure! I really like the white outline here and Gail's poofy shoulders here - the art style feels reminiscent of Final Fantasy Tactics.

Seri also draws Gail bearing her late game equipment. Unique to Seri's drawing is how all of Gail's equipment is accessible from a pocket on her shirt. I also like how Gail is depicted with her lucky earrings - that accessory is often forgotten.

Treedude depicts Gail with a bat and wearing a funny smirk. She looks like she's ready to hurt someone!

Warotar returns with everyone's favorite Great Drake, Bubbles! It seems so happy to be featured!

I'm really grateful for all the fanart this game has received. From the bottom of my heart, thank you!

Closing Notes

Pirate drew a picture to mark the occasion. It shows Gail enjoying a hot chocolate with marshmallows and a pumpkin muffin. A rest well-earned...

Goodbye! Until next time!

[faerielleart]

Hello Angie! I hope you're great...So, I love watching people drawing and painting and I'm curious about the process of finding your own style. How was your process on finding your own style? Have you ever feell like a copycat on some moment of your artistical journey?

heyo anon! thanks for the super interesting question, i hope i can deliver an equally interesting answer :’) <333

imma start off by saying that i am still figuring out *my* artstyle and i find my art to be very, very, very inconsistent at this point. i do have some specific traits that i guess kinda characterize my art and make it ✨mine✨ but i don’t think i have a super recognizable style, working on it tho ☝️ hopefully one day i’ll post something and someone’ll go “OHH THAT WAS TOTALLY DRAWN BY ANGIE I CAN TELL FROM THE STYLE” but that day is probably centuries away-

rather than calling it my art style, i’m using “my art traits”, and the process of finding them and standardizing them in my brain was totally done through experimenting! and probably the most important thing for me is lighting and shadows, and i am super inspired by the painter caravaggio and i’ve done studies of his painting ever since i was in school. my mom went to art school and graduated from an important art academy so i’ve kind of always done studies on artistic movements and stuff like that bc my house is literally falling down from the amount of art books my mom collected over the years since she was a teen 💀💀 still got some of her original school textbooks as well. and that’s where i draw most of my inspiration really! i am mostly inspired by impressionism and macchiaioli as far as movements go. also was pretty obsessed with doing studies of degas’ ballerinas some years ago when i was still doing traditional art and painting with actual paint LOL but that’s how you learn! through being a “copycat”!

i feel like there’s such a huge issue in the art community with “copying/referencing” when really it’s the only fucking way to learn, period. how do you learn anatomy? by copying a real human body. how do you learn how to paint lights and shadows? by copying how light hits objects in real life. how do you learn how to paint backgrounds? by copying real environments. i’ve never really felt like a “copycat” per se bc imho referencing IS fundamental and it’s impossible to learn without it, anyone who says otherwise is straight up lying LOL or trying to make themselves look ✨cool and gifted that they never need references✨ or whatever

but yeah experiments experiments and more experiments and trying out techniques and following tutorials over and over again until you start to pick up on things and do them automatically and give them your own twist by more experimenting, and boom, art style

as far as digital artists go, i absolutely love two italian ladies, angela vianello and mirka andolfo, and i am VERY influenced by their art :D here’s some examples of their art (I EVEN MET MIRKA AT A CON A FEW YEARS AGO SHE DREW ME A DOODLE AND AUTOGRAPHED IT AJDJDKDJDJDJ)

[pynkhues]

Hi Sophie! I’m an aspiring writer and I had a question for you!! How did you go on about finding an agent? Also how does one find job postings related to writing? (Tv, etc.) I’m very inspired by you and how talented you are!!!

Hi, anon! Thank you for your kind words, and it’s so exciting that you’re an aspiring writer! I think knowing that you want to write really is the first step on a pretty incredible journey, and it’s one that it helps have to have tools on. Knowing how to ask questions, like you did, is a great way to start building that toolkit too.

Especially because your writing toolkit will be something you build, because there’s not really one answer to either of your questions. I really mean it when I say writing and publishing is a journey, and as a part of that, the pathways people choose to take (and the pathways available to them) often vary a lot, and are impacted by so many things, from where you live to the genre and medium you write in to the networks you have access to.

I’m going to try to answer that for you as well as I can here which I hope will be a useful starting point for you, but I will be contextualizing it a bit with the fact that a) I’m in Australia, which has a bit of a different industry to many parts of the world (in no small part because we have a very small population), and b) that I worked in the industry before I started having my work published, which did give me a jump start and a pretty good network of professional and personal support.

Okay!

So let’s jump in.

Behind a cut because this got a bit long.

How did I get an agent?

Well! I was rejected by four agents before I got one, haha, so that in itself was a bit of an adventure. It meant that I was effectively my own agent for quite a while (something that’s quite normal in Australia for reasons I’ll talk about later), which meant doing everything from pitching works to teaching myself enough legal vocabulary to negotiate contracts (not my strong suit honestly, haha).

The first two agents I ever spoke to were both agents that weren’t open for unsolicited submissions. This is an important term in the industry, because what that means is that they’re not reading any new writers who:

they didn’t invite to submit (usually this would be after you’d won a prize, or they’d read your short story or essay in a journal or magazine, loved it and got in touch)

didn’t come recommended by colleagues; or

didn’t come through their existing networks.

Does that mean you can’t get your work in front of them? It doesn’t actually. Usually when agents aren’t open for unsolicited submissions, they’ll still be interested in work. It just usually means they don’t have the time for a massive slush pile. What they frequently do in these instances instead is that they’ll attend conferences, festivals, workshops or events and do pitching sessions a couple of times a year. That usually looks like you booking a five, ten or fifteen minute window, generally for free (be cautious if they’re charging extra on top of your event ticket) and doing a verbal pitch of your project.

I’ve done a lot of these at various events in various contexts (it’s always hell, haha), but only twice to agents. Once was at the CYA Conference in Brisbane (which is a charged pitch but the money’s a donation towards the Children’s Book Council), where I pitched a YA manuscript I’ve since put in my bottom-drawer, and Emerging Writers Festival in Melbourne, where I pitched The Rabbits, which is my novel which came out in July with Penguin Australia.

Those pitching sessions went just okay. Both liked my pitches, but the agent at CYA had a full stable of YA authors and was more looking for middle-grade fiction, which meant my story skewed too old. She gave me her card if I ever wrote for a younger audience, but otherwise declined to invite me to submit. Again, this is frequently actually why an agent might be closed to submissions or they might reject your work even if they like it – they're just at capacity with what you're pitching.

The one at EWF went better and I was invited to submit my complete manuscript, but she told me that while she thought I was a good writer, she didn’t personally like my writing style and therefore didn’t think she could sell it. She did actually invite me to submit something else if I had something more commercial, but I really figured that if she didn’t like my writing style, she probably wasn’t going to like whatever else I sent her, so I ended up declining because I thought it would be a waste of both our time.

The other two agents I submit to were both open for unsolicited submissions so I didn’t have to go through events. In both cases, I did cold submissions, which just means we’d never spoken before, so when you do that you need to put together a query packet because - - well. They don’t know who you are, haha. All publishers and agents have different requirements for their query packet and these should be listed on their website (if they’re not, feel really empowered to email and ask – in all of my industry experience, they have always infinitely preferred you doing that to guessing. It shows you know the etiquette and want to get it right).

Generally speaking though, what you're looking at pulling together for a packet is usually:

A cover letter explaining who you are, why you’re interested in them being your agent (being familiar with who else they represent is a good thing to highlight), and what story you’re selling them on.

A one-page synopsis of your manuscript.

A writing CV if you have one, or another relevant CV (i.e. if you're pitching a non-fiction book on being a nurse in the pandemic, attaching your nursing CV so they can see you're legitimate is important).

And usually either the first 50 pages or the first three chapters of your novel.

You generally email that to them, it goes into a slush pile, and they’ll read through it when they get the chance. I got a personalized rejection from one, which is pretty lovely (getting a personal rejection instead of one that’s clearly an email template from agents, editors and publishers might sound silly, but they’re actually pretty significant. These are people who get thousands of manuscripts a year, and taking the time to write a reply usually means your work resonated enough that they want to give you that encouragement even if the answer’s still no), and the other, I never heard back from, and my follow up email was ignored. Less lovely, haha, but unfortunately not uncommon.

So yeah, I took a bit of a break from seeking out an agent then, which I could do in Australia. One of the benefits of having a small industry here is that there’s a very limited number of agents (we’re talking literally about 25), which means submissions outside of agents and agencies are pretty normal. My understanding in the US and the UK is that you’re not really going to get a look-in without an agent, but in Australia you can submit direct, having an agent just makes it a lot easier.

So I didn’t have an agent when I actually got offered my book deal. I’d submit The Rabbits to a few different publishers, it had been rejected already by a couple and was still in the slush pile at one when I submit it to the Penguin Literary Prize. It won (yay!), Penguin offered me a book deal, and when the news broke in industry news, I was approached by six different agents, including, hilariously, the agent who said she didn’t like my writing style, haha.

I ended up talking to a few of them, but I went with a fairly new agent who I’d known through industry work, and I went with her because she had a really strong legal background which is what I was personally interested in.

Because that’s an important thing to consider too.

Why do you want an agent?

I actually knew that I didn’t really need an agent to sell my work. I’d been doing that for ten years already, I have over twenty short stories and a novella published, I’d sold my book, and I’d sold the rights to a screenplay already on my own, so the ability for an agent to sell work wasn’t so important to me. What was important to me was having someone who had a background in publishing law (my agent actually worked in the rights team in-house at a top five publisher before she became an agent), and understood rights management particularly in digital rights and international rights, because it makes my head spin, haha.

So that’s why I went with her!

But how do you find agents?

You didn’t ask this question exactly, but I think this is a very relevant question. There are databases of agents and publishers out there – Duotrope is probably the best known and I know people rave about it. One of the things that’s useful about it is that it’ll do a bit of a breakdown listing what genres the agent reads, if they’re currently open to unsolicited submissions, and their requirements. Take a look at Ginger Clark’s page for example (she’s not my agent – she’s American for starters, haha – but I have worked with her before and she’s a gem. Her most famous client is probably Ursula K. Le Guin, but she reps tons of other people too).

So yeah! Duotrope’s really useful. It has free info but also a paywall for certain things, and I personally find it kinda difficult to navigate?

I'd actually instead just recommend you take a look at writers you like and admire, especially ones who write similar genres to you, and just Google who their agent is. They all have websites, so they’re a lot easier to find these days than they were. 😊

How do you find job postings related to writing?

This is a tricky one, anon, as it depends on what sort of jobs you’re looking at. If you’re looking for copywriting opportunities, outlets for articles, short stories, poetry or essays, publishers who are posting open calls for manuscripts, or even cultural production jobs, those are all pretty different things. SO! I’m going to answer this one a little more broadly.

Writers Centres are your friends. Full disclaimer, I worked at one for five and a half years, and have been a member of Writers Victoria since I moved to Melbourne. They’re incredible resources for not only opportunities, but workshops, pitching, professional and creative development, community, networking and advice. They literally exist to help you achieve your goals.

- Writers Victoria maintains a free calendar of Opportunities and Competitions, but publishes more in their quarterly magazine which is a member perk. They’ll also often share job opportunities through their social media channels. I also still get the free e-news for Queensland Writers Centre and Writing NSW too because sometimes they share different stuff.

- I’ve heard Gotham Writers in New York is good too if you’re in America, but really I’d just suggest googling where you live and writers centre and seeing what comes up!

- Similarly festivals. I’ve worked at Brisbane Writers Festival and National Young Writers Festival here in Australia (the latter’s on online right now if you want to check out their free program!) Sign up to your local festival’s e-news, follow them on social media, they’ll usually share stuff.

- Speaking of! Social media! Haha. Twitter is often good for sharing jobs, competitions and opportunities, but I find it can be a bit of a cesspool too where people bombard the hashtags with self-promotion, so approach with caution. I find Facebook groups are way better for it personally, especially as there are a lot of specialized groups that are focused in certain or on certain writers. I know there’s lots for BIPOC writers for instance, I’m personally in a few and recommend:

Binders Full of WRITING JOBS

Binger Full of Copywriters

Style Binders – Writers in Fashion, Lifestyle and Beauty

Binder Full of Editors Seeking their Freelance Writers and Vice Versa

If you’re in Australia though, I’d especially recommend:

Women in Arts Management Collective (particularly if you’re interested in cultural production work)

Film and TV Networking Australia

Melbourne Women in Film

Writers Victoria Members

Australian Binder Full of Women Writers

Australian Arts Amidst COVID-19

Young Australian Writers

I think most of these are searchable, so just have a look, but also google your city or state + writer and see what pops up.

Otherwise, as much as it sucks to say it, a lot of the industry is who you know, so try and find ways to connect and meet with people and forge your own little community. Go to events – festivals, book launches, book clubs, join Facebook groups and in particular, if there are journals or magazines that are made in your local area, go to their launches and the events they run, no matter how big or small, and just chat to people there. As you get more established, you can be more discerning about what you go to, but when you're starting out, these are powderkegs of community and connection, and they breed suppport and, if you find the right people, you'll grow and develop together too.

Being a writer can often be pretty lonely, but being a part of supportive industry really makes all the difference, and as an old mentor of mine said – creative karma is real. You support the people coming up around you, and you’ll not only be creating a better, more inclusive and welcoming industry, but an industry that supports you right back. 😊

[closer-stars]

Fall of the Kingdom

Member: Hongjoong Word Count: 4.4k (mmmm) Genre: it’s just... Dark... and drama. Content: Demon Hongjoong’s got a war but he needs to feed on humans first. Mentions of explosions, violence, blood, suicide ideation (only brushed upon, nothing in detail i promise). Note: This idea came to me after seeing rocker hongjoong and that Iconic dark smile he does. Also this was technically done in one go cause I was Feeling the Inspiration so forgive me if it’s messy. Also this was just an Excuse for me to indulge in an interest of mine. Taglist: @barsformars @miniyeo @hwaberrykiwi @jwyfldr @fvae @yeotlny @inkigayeo

“I’ve become so numb, can’t feel you there. 

I’ve become so tired, so much more aware.”

There was something about this new song that made you feel breathless, as if all the frustration and pent up anger has been sucked out of you. Just like the song, you feel a little numb. It was a good thing you were sitting down too, you could barely feel your own legs after that song. If there was a song to describe what your life has made you feel, it would be this song. There were days where you didn’t feel real, if you were still capable of feeling emotions, if you can still reach the expectations of people put onto you. 

Silence passes over your earphones and that’s when you realize that the song had ended, loading the next video. You quickly stopped autoplay and had the video play again. This time you had to get yourself to watch the music video. The vocals alone had put you through an array of emotions you didn’t think you could still feel. You weren’t ready for what the video was about to give you. His smile was alluring as if promising you that you are something. His gaze reminding the viewers of strength innate in them even after years of mistreatment from life. To have an artist properly encapsulate all the emotions in you just had you hooked. You wanted more.

No.

You need more. 

‘By. Hongjoong.’

You’ve never heard of this artist before. Is he new to the music scene?  There’s next to nothing about this Hongjoong online. Just this song on what you assume is his YouTube channel. Just a few thousand views for now. There are a few comments, praising him for his music and his looks (you had to admit, he does look quite attractive.) but not much for you to go about. For now, you drop a like and subscribed to the guy’s channel. 

Within the next few days, the views rose to the millions. Comments in various languages were pouring in, all of which seemed to be praise. The comment section has become a forum, people asking others about him. Even you were reading comments hoping for more information. The only sign that he was a real entity behind the screen was the description on his video.

It wasn’t there when you first viewed the music video.

“Hello there. I am Kim Hongjoong. This is my first single, Numb. Please look forward to my future releases!”

He stayed true to his word. Over the past few months, his following has grown. He doesn’t have any other social media account except his Youtube and Instagram (that was only opened recently). While there was a distance between him and his fans in terms of interactions, his music made up for it. His music much like his first single, stayed consistent for being for an audience who have been ignored by life, who struggle for a break. Say My Name, his second single reached a million views within two days. Much like the title, more and more people are talking about him. His music is played in shops and restaurants. It’s hitting the top of the charts and staying there for weeks. He never leaves the Top 10 at least. 

People assumed he was going to be a one hit wonder, a lot of independent artists are. But he’s proven them wrong, not through posts on Instagram but through consistently dropping song after song. Songs that remain stuck in your head for weeks to come until he drops another one. The new one being better than the former. He was only getting started. The media and general public have called him a digital monster. Yet, despite all the songs he’s released, no one knows who he really is. Any interview he’s done with the media only scratches the surface of his musical process and his personality. There’s more to him, you’re sure but you just couldn’t place what that ‘more’ is. 

People were already commenting on his social media and making posts begging for him to do a concert, or any sort of live performance. Surely his music would sound much better in real life?

On the other hand, there were those who weren’t into his style. They assume and point fingers at him for being someone who associated themselves with the Anti-Christ due to his heavy imagery and music. It’s an age old argument with no solid proof to back it up. Any tongue that speaks against Hongjoong’s music was quickly dealt with by his fans. Though you didn’t like the way they dealt with the opposing views, they had it coming. 

After Horizon’s release, he dropped another video. Not a music video, but it seems like him talking to the camera. 

“Hello everyone. This is Kim Hongjoong.” 

You didn’t think he would speak in such a soft tone. He was dressed head to toe in black, very reminiscent and consistent with his music style, not that you expected anything different. It just seems to fall in line with who he is from what you’ve seen. 

“To everyone’s delight, I will be doing a countrywide tour within the next few months. The dates, venues and where to buy are in the description down below. I hope to see you there.” He doesn’t say anything else, but the corners of his lips curve, a charming smile, very much unlike the dark heavy gazes and grins he dons in his music videos. 

The video announcement quickly gains views and comments. Foreign fans weeping for an opportunity they can’t experience, begging him to visit them too. Local fans were celebrating in the comments, excited to hear his other hits, especially his debut song, Numb. 

To your delight, he’s doing a show near your area. You had to see this guy in the flesh. What better way to deal with your frustrations than with live music? There’s something about his music and him that gives you such an emotional high and that was from just the screen, what more if it were live? You immediately got yourself a ticket, before it got sold out. 

Two months before D-day.

--------

Hongjoong has been monitoring the numbers and interactions done on his posts. It’s easy to see how delighted he is. Even with next to no information about him, he managed to garner a loyal following not only here but internationally as well. 

Here’s the thing with this Kim Hongjoong. He’s not human. Not in the fandom praise for his superb skills in music making, no, he’s not from the human realm. Instead, he’s a demon. A demon that feeds on the frustrations of humans. Those wronged by life and society were the most susceptible to his charms. Every night, he walks through the streets, unrecognized by the public. ‘How stupid.’ He thinks as they pass by him without batting an eyelash. He can smell the catharsis of those who listen to his creations. It’s only then that he can point out those who carry bitterness in their hearts, otherwise he waits. 

He feels himself get stronger with each passing day. Soon, he’ll be able to show why he’s one of the Greater Princes of Hell. Lesser demons and humans as his soldiers? How delightful would it be to have the damned souls work for him. Surely it would make Wooyoung jealous but he delights in his jealousy. 

Was he worried that he won’t get as strong as he wants to? Not at all. Nothing to be worried about when the numbers show just how much people have become an avid follower of his regardless of distance. 

Now one might wonder why he does this. What else other than to prove to the beings above him that the ones that call the shots with humans are beings like him? The fearful physique and near perfect mentality of the angels are what pushes people away from believing in redemption. Meanwhile him? He and his fellow demons look like anyone else, save for the striking eye colors and sharper than usual teeth. It’s easy to creep on humans when they deem you as one of them. 

He’s careful though, making sure no one recognizes him by his voice when he’s out with the humans. The glamour of being “mysterious” does more than what his peers expected. With the concerts coming up, it makes it easier for him and his fellow demons to find potential hosts to continue their work. 

He’s not foolish.

--------

It’s D-Day and you made sure you looked decent for a long night. In the months that led to this fateful day, you’ve made friends with those who were also fans of Hongjoong. A lot of them were chaotic, but it was something you’ve come to accept. There were always going to be fans that would start a fight for the sake of their favorite artist. While you weren’t one of them, you weren’t one to stop them either should they start fighting someone. Who are you to tell them what to do when you blind yourself at the face of violence. 

The lights dim, thick smoke pour from the sides and Hongjoong enters the stage much to the roaring of the fans. They chant his name over and over. It almost feels like a prayer with how fervent they are. 

His cocky grin graces his features, with a wave of his hand, the cheering grows louder. It’s loud enough to make the venue feel hot and sticky from the energy. 

This is what he wanted. 

“Hello everyone! I hope all of you are prepared for the best night of your lives.” He coos into the mic. You could already hear a few women shrieking for his attention to which he gives. 

The show stars and entire venue feels like it’s shaking from the constant jumping from the crowd. For a split second, you were a little scared of how the ceiling might cave in from the collective jumping. The chants from the fans are reaching a feverish high. The volume and emotion behind the voices of people who seem to have suffered the same life as you: mistreated, ignored, kicked to the side. All of them want to be heard, to feel as if someone understands. 

Hongjoong does. Just not in the way they expected. 

Somewhere through the show, you lose sight of your friends. All of them have managed to reach near the barricade, hoping to get a fleeting touch of his hand. As if his touch would be the solution to all their problems. Hongjoong stays near the edge of the stage but never does he go near the crowd, much to their desire to be closer to him. 

‘Fools.’ The thought is hidden behind a dark smirk. Some on the side have decided to argue, saying that his smirk was for them and not the other. 

Everything feels suffocating; the smoke from the smoke machine, along with the pulsating bodies as if moving as one around you. You feel lightheaded, overwhelmed but heavens be damned because at the same time, you feel so alive. It feels like the crowd is moving as one to Hongjoong’s voice. Despite the suffocation, everything feels so right. 

The safety is short lived. To the side, you see a fight breaking out between two guys. You couldn’t clearly see what’s going on but you could tell that punches were being thrown from either side. It’s gotten to the point where the bouncers had to kick them out of the venue, the crowd filling in on the gaps of where the two once were. The show carries on, but you opt to stick to the back to stay out of the still brimming chaos within the crowd. 

He’s not fazed by the violence the erupts in the crowd. He lives for it actually. It’s what he wanted to happen. All the emotions concentrated in one room, nothing could beat this feeling. Not even a seat in Heaven could replace the feeling of pleasure he receives from his followers. 

The show ends with his debut song Numb. You never left your spot near the exit, you can only imagine the chaos if you left with the crowd of people once the show ends. He blows a few kisses to the crowd, bidding them goodbye and that he’ll see them soon. Whenever that might be. 

You leave the premises when he leaves the stage. Time to avoid the crowds. 

He stays inside the venue, taking in all the emotions and catharsis as much as possible. It’s the aftermath that always tastes the best. The dazed feeling of his followers as their emotions crash from such a high cathartic moment. The surplus of violent catharsis momentarily has his eyes turn white. It’s rather difficult to keep the human facade when you feel the power surge through your body. Unfortunately, keeping the facade of a human while taking what you need in order to become stronger makes it much more difficult. Such a prison can only take so much. 

After all, should the people hold onto their bitterness, it can only give way to violence. 

A fellow Greater Demon, a being who named himself Jongho for the sake of normalcy,  somehow eyes the still lingering crowd with interest. “You’ve outdone yourself once more. The last you did this was centuries ago wasn’t it?” He can still taste the left over frustrations, such shall be left with the people. Give them some time and that small seed becomes something bigger especially with what Hongjoong still has up his sleeve. The last time Hongjoong had tried to look for a host, disaster struck the nation and forced him into hiding until recently. “What are you going to do with the left overs?” 

“That’s right. I failed to find a potential host back then. The potential hosts I wanted just disintegrated into ashes.” He mutters. It’s thanks to him the phenomenon of spontaneous human combustion came to light. He straightens himself up, his eyes flashing white as he tries to contain the energy he has absorbed. “As for the leftovers, let the people keep it. Chaos shall ensue with what I have next.” 

“Did you find someone now?” The plan Hongjoong has doesn’t matter to Jongho. What matters is that Hongjoong finds a potential host. That won’t suffer the same fate as those in the past. 

He remembers you, clearly staying towards the back, always turning a blind eye to the violence that was around you and he grins. 

--------

The cool air outside the venue was a needed break from everything. It’s only then that you realize how hungry and exhausted you are. Truth be told, after that concert, you could probably sleep for a week with how physically and emotionally exhausted you are. 

But first things first. You need to eat. 

You find yourself in a fast food restaurant. It was the only thing you could stomach after such a long day of running around with friends and an emotionally charged concert. 

There weren’t much people in the establishment. Only two tables were occupied and they were clearly people who didn’t attend the concert. You sit by the corner, busying yourself with your burger and nuggets. The iced fruit juice could tide over your thirst until you head home. 

You look up when you see someone enter the premises. If it weren’t for your quick reflexes, you would’ve dropped your food. 

It’s Kim Hongjoong. Only he’s already out of his stage clothes but his makeup still gives him away.

There’s nowhere to hide from his view. Instead, you look down and focus on your meal. You try to eat as fast as you can even at the risk of choking.  It’s too much for your poor heart. You who went through adrenaline, frustration, anger, then relief in one day. To be in the same establishment as The Kim Hongjoong was too much for you to keep up with. 

“Is this seat taken?” 

You look at the feet then look up. You try to hide the fact you could recognize him but from the sound of his chuckle, you failed. You gesture to the seat across you as you try to chew slowly. Kim Hongjoong is in front of you. Surely this is just a dream? 

He chuckles softly at how you’re staring at him still. “Yes I’m real.” He says as if reading your mind. He finds your shy nature a little endearing, just what he needs for his plans. 

“I thought you would still be in the venue…” You admit softly as you try to eat slowly this time. Surely it would be rude to finish before him now that he had just started eating? 

“I never agreed to any meet and greet so I managed to leave the premises early.” He explains. It’s whiplash how soft his mannerisms were compared to his music. “What’s your name? You were in my concert weren’t you?” He asks, gesturing to the neon band wrapped around your wrist.

Before you could deny anything, he catches you red handed. You relent to his wishes and tell him your name. “How could you even see me? I was at the back.” Surely he couldn’t see you through all the blinding lights.

He just shoots you a mischievous wink. “I have my ways, dear.” He leads the conversation for the rest of the time, asking you how you found him, your thoughts about his music, and so on. It felt like you were just talking to an old friend who just made it big. You felt at ease with him. 

You look at the time and nearly jump out of your seat. “Crap, it’s late. I have to go..” You admit, dejected at having to cut the conversation short. Hongjoong had other plans though, he stood up, grabbing what’s left of his fries and his iced coffee. 

“I can give you a ride home. Where do you live?” 

This is too good to be true. 

--------

On the ride home, he asks you about yourself, your life, how you find yourself holding up despite everything. You admit that you have a hard time holding yourself up, even having daydreams of the unspeakable. That mere idea puts a frown on his face. The stoplight turns red and his fingers immediately tip your chin up to make you look at him in the eye. The tip of his thumb brushes against the bottom of your lip and in your shock of how fast he moves, your mouth is left slightly open. 

“Don’t.” 

There’s something in his tone that tells you to not go against his words. It’s perhaps better to not divulge your daydreams, so you promise that you won’t. 

He flashes a warm smile at you just in time for the stoplight to turn green. 

You don’t know that he’s already imparted a bit of his essence into you. ‘Humans, how gullible.’ 

---------

By the time he drops you outside your apartment complex, you’ve exchanged contact details. Both sides hope to stay in touch as much as possible. “Thank you for the ride! Stay safe on the road!” You say as you jog inside. 

The male watches you enter the premises of your complex before driving off. Jongho materializes on the seat you left. “How was it?” 

The grin on Hongjoong’s lips tells him everything he needed. 

---------

Time has passed and the two of you have been talking consistently day in and day out. The genuinity of the bond was something that made you feel like life was a little bearable now. Shitty but still bearable thanks to Hongjoong and his music. You’ve admitted to him how your life hasn’t been the best and how his music has been something helping you through. 

It’s radio silence by next week. No matter how many messages you send him, you receive no sign of him reading it or a response. You genuinely feared losing someone you considered a friend (and a crush but let’s not talk about that). Did he just ghost you? 

The silence stretches into months, and the happiness you felt in the previous weeks have disappeared, morphing into the familiar dread you’re too familiar with by now. You’ve accepted the fact that he may have just ghosted you but the radio silence on his youtube channel tells you there’s more to just the regular ghosting. 

“BREAKING: Rock icon, Kim Hongjoong has been deemed missing. More info to come at 5PM.” 

Something in your stomach drops and you look around you. Hongjoong had already amassed a large following over the past year. In this room alone, you could assume there were ten fans. All eyes were glued to the tv screen. In the distance you hear a loud explosion and sirens, you get out of your seat immediately, leaving the premises. What the fuck is going on? 

By the time you stepped foot outside the restaurant, someone comes barreling towards you. Isn’t this the same guy that caused a fight in his concert? You could recognize steely eyes anywhere, but what was his name? The more important question is, why does he look so bloodied and dirty? Also, what was he running from? The two of you stare at each other for a moment before the police have come chasing after him. You’re left with no option but to give way to his chasers. 

It’s better to head home than to stay out any longer at this rate. 

“BREAKING: Suspect of the explosion earlier today has been caught along with his accomplices.” 

Finally back at home, the news outlets have been trying to keep up with the sudden influx of events. Kim Hongjoong has been missing for five days. The explosion from earlier was made by a Kang Yeosang who is, coincidentally, also a fan of Hongjoong. It’s already known everywhere that a fan of Hongjoong is good enough of a cult member. Now Hongjoong might not have mentioned anything about a better land or the second coming like most cult leaders but with the amassed following he has despite his disappearance, they might as well be a cult. 

There’s speculation on social media as to what exactly had happened to Hongjoong but nothing is for certain. Fanbases are trying to find Hongjoong’s whereabouts only to come up empty. Fake accounts are popping up, proclaiming themselves to be Hongjoong, giving false leads to anyone who believes. 

Some fans have resorted to violence, hoping to get back the artist that they think genuinely understands them. It’s a warzone online and in real life. You’re seeing posts, unsure if they’re real or not, of fans wishing they were the ones that disappeared instead of Hongjoong. Overwhelmed with everything, you shut off your phone and bury yourself in your bed. His music plays faintly and it’s the only thing that’s holding you to the real world. 

Everything else doesn’t feel real. 

As each day passes, there’s another case of violence and death. It’s got the city by its neck with how rampant the chaos has been. The only way you’re staying sane through it all is through your detachment to all the violence that runs amok around you. 

“BREAKING: a 22 year old man caught dead after pretending to be the missing artist Kim Hongjoong online. More information on the found mass burial site to follow at 6PM”

You’ve busied yourself by searching the internet for other artists, hoping to find someone to fill in the hole Hongjoong has left. None of them do the job the way Hongjoong does it. You try to call his number, hoping for something.

“The number you have dialed is out of use. Please check the number you have dialed and try again.” 

Please let this just be a dream. 

You had a restless sleep that night, tossing and turning. Your dreams were wrought with Hongjoong’s voice, screaming for your help. His voice surrounds your helpless figure until you stop in your tracks and scream out in pain. You’re jolted awake and you feel your body drenched in sweat and fear.  “Hongjoong, where are you?” You plead softly, utterly helpless. 

The leads regarding Hongjoong decrease as each day passes and fans and the general public have resigned themselves to the fate that he had died. Some of his fans have gone their own ways, though their chaotic ways have never faltered. You on the other hand, still tried to find traces of him despite not knowing a lot about him. 

---------

On the other side of the city, Hongjoong watches the news from Jongho’s living quarters. He’s delighted to see the stress and fear from regular humans. A little variety from the stress of his followers. It’s a good thing he left some violence behind with his followers, those who have nothing to lose do cause the best havoc. Maybe he should keep that Yeosang guy alive to learn a few more tricks. He doesn’t need to tell his followers what to do. Just disappear at the height of his fame and let them do the work. 

He takes a shot of vodka as he continues to watch on. Jongho splayed on the couch, watches as well. “What do you think?” 

“Perfect. I think Lucifer would be delighted in this. I can already tell my legions are growing with the amount of deaths.” 

“How soon will the war be then?” Jongho’s legions are already waiting for his word. His human body appears to be a lot tankier than expected. 

“Give my host three months, their nature is perfect in amassing followers around the globe.” 

--------

You have another dream that night, a familiar voice with that addicting smile. “Hongjoong?” You call out, running wherever his voice is coming from.  “Hongjoong where are you?!” You call out again but he doesn’t reply, he only giggles at how strained you are to look for him. While it’s perfect to strike when they least expect it, it’s also just as good to strike when they’re at their weakest. 

You somehow manage to find him. He looks a little different now, stronger, and something about him doesn’t feel human. He sits on a throne, painted white with obsidian sprinkled upon the back. He doesn’t seem affected by how distraught and confused you look. In fact, he actually laughs at your face at how pitiful you look. He gives you a set of instructions. All of which point to a war that only heaven and hell can conceive. 

“Only then can you find me, my dear. Don’t let me down.”

Your eyes glow white when you wake up. Who are you to deny his wishes?

[wtf-yoongi]

“Let me play you what I have.”

pairing | yoongi x reader

summary | yoongi asks for your help with a song

genre/warnings | you’re both musicians (even though you don’t work in the music industry) so musician fluff i guess?

words | 1,648

note | i’m not even kidding at this point i think i’m in love with yoongi and i’ve never been more serious in the entirety of my life

“Mine was never this glamorous,” you joke as you stare into the high ceilings of the ground floor of the building. “This place is gigantic.”

“Well, it is fancy and over the top,” Yoongi agrees and shrugs as if he’s 100% indifferent to it all. “But this is just to impress visitors.”

You look around, trying to take in as much as you can while you follow Yoongi to the elevator area. Everything seems to be made of either glass or marble – well, the best glass and marble money can buy. The attention to detail is remarkable and you can’t help but agree with Yoongi: this is a little bit over the top.

“I thought you had seen this the last time you were here.” He looks at you now, taking turns between staring at your face and your hands. You can’t do it here where the walls are made of glass even if he’s wearing a cap and a mask, but you know his fingers are twitching.

“Not really,” you correct him and shake your head lightly. “First time I was here was before the tour. You gave me a ride and we took the elevator straight from the garage.”

“Oh…” Yoongi nods. He remembers now. “I should have showed you the place that day, sorry. We were in a rush.”

There’s a soft sound, signaling one of the elevators has finally arrived. Yoongi impatiently taps his right foot on the ground like he just wants the doors to open faster. You know he’s a little apprehensive from the moment he calls you to come around earlier, but you didn’t think you’d find him like this. 

You just want to calm him down somehow.

As soon as you’re safe inside the elevator with the doors closed, you extend your hand to him and his fingers stop fidgeting immediately to take yours. “You didn’t have to come greet me downstairs,” you comment casually, but there’s gratitude in your eyes.

“I know, I wanted to,” he says, taking his mask off and putting it in his pocket with his free hand. “And I needed to get out of the studio a little bit.”

“Something wrong?”

“Just a song that won’t come together, the usual,” he mocks and smiles to the ground. “This one is going to be stubborn, I just know it. I’ve been playing with this idea for days now and I don’t think I have a full verse yet.”

Yoongi’s voice is tired and passionate at the same time. Even if he’s complaining about it, you know he likes this sort of struggle to accomplish something he’s happy and satisfied with – the reward may be as grand as the effort. He’s always hoping for that. Artists are always hoping for that, you know it all too well.

“I was actually hoping you’d help me, if you don’t mind.”

He brings it up quietly and casually, but when you turn your face to him he’s not looking directly at you, deciding to keep his stare into the ground. He isn’t exactly comfortable with that idea and doesn’t know if it’ll work, but he’s happy to try.

You’ve talked about doing something together, working on lyrics or melodies or whatever came to mind, but never put much thought into it. Like that old group of friends who keep on saying you should meet sometime, but never actually do. You’re not mad if it never happens, somethings aren’t supposed to happen anyway.

Yoongi finally raises his head after he doesn’t hear it from you for a while, eyes expecting a positive reply so he doesn’t have to pretend that never happened somehow. Inside his mind, he’s already thinking about ways he can make it less awkward.

“That’s why you asked me to come?” You ask in a curious tone. 

“Well, yeah,” Yoongi laughs lightly and presses his left hand to the back of his neck, scratching it a bit in a nervous habit. “It’s ok if you don’t want to, though. It’d be good to just hang around and do nothing as well, I’m just waiting for some papers I have to sign and we can go somewhere if you want. It’s probably good to give the song some time as well, since…”

“We can try something, yeah,” you interrupt before he runs out of air. “I’m a little rusty, though, I don’t really know if I’ll be able to help with anything.”

“Nah, don’t worry about it.” Yoongi shakes his head and his hand follows. “I want you to listen and give me your opinion, that’s already enough for me. And I highly doubt it.”

You don’t have time to question him what the last part is about. As if on queue, you arrive on the 21st floor and it’s really not as fancy as the lobby, just like you remember, but you can see someone was still thoughtful enough to add fresh flowers to the vase in the corner. The people in charge of running the building are not sleeping on the job.

Yoongi is silently dragging you around the corridors and you can see the directions on the wall, but not for long enough to make any sense of them. A dozen more steps and you both stop in front of a door, Yoongi quickly tapping the keyboard on the right. There’s a beep before it opens.

He reaches inside to turn on the lights, but ultimately lets you in first. The room looks just like the last time, simple and straightforward in furniture and color, but not in music equipment. You can see he upgraded the digital piano to one that looked more like a real one, but still plugged to the wall. Maybe it makes him feel better knowing it’s a little similar to the real deal?

“New piano?”

“Yeah,” he assents, closing the door behind him. “These keys feel a little better, you know?”

Yes, you know. You can always tell when the keys just feel better under your fingertips. Playing becomes easier, practicing technique feels less like a pain. You nod.

“Let me play you what I have.”

You sit on the couch in one corner while Yoongi sits on his own chair, moving his magic mouse to light up the screen in front of him. You can see there are many layers on top of one another, but definitely not as many as you would expect coming from him. 

You’ve seen him working from home well past midnight, shirt half dressed with headphones on, keeping quiet so he doesn’t notice you behind him. Making music is intricate, but Yoongi likes it even worse, adding one thing on top of the other, filter after filter, until it feels like it’s too much and he can finally recognize what is standing out in a bad way. Then he mutes and saves the ones he likes for another time.

He makes some quick adjustments before pressing the spacebar, turning slightly so he can see your reaction. The beat you hear is nothing out of the ordinary – it’s a 4/4 time signature major key song, exactly how most happy pop ones go.

However, in true Yoongi style, there’s something else to it. The bass line tricks your head into some sort of rhythm and, despite having the poppiest of beats, you can hear an acoustic guitar streaming in the very background, almost unnoticeable. More bars pass and you can now hear a piano playing some sort of arpeggio – simple, but effective. It grows into what you feel is a chorus and then Yoongi is hitting the spacebar again.

“That’s all I have,” he confesses and shrugs, looking at you from under his eyelashes and trying to figure out your puzzled expression.

“It’s good, I like it,” you start and he’s soon looking at you incredulously, waiting for the real response. “Yeah, it needs work, but you made it sound like you had nothing.”

You’re both chuckling softly now and Yoongi lets his body fall into the chair completely, covering his face with his hands.

“Tell me what I have to do!” He begs with a muffled voice. “I hate this song already.”

All of a sudden, you feel like you should have done this earlier. His busy schedule kind of gets in the way all the time, but not really all the time. You wish any of you had enough courage to bring this up earlier, to stop being that group of friends that say things with no real weight to them. 

Musicians are sometimes overprotective of their work or scared to stick their noses into somebody else’s, but Yoongi falls into his normal self too fast – too comfortable, no sign of nervousness anymore. He’s not scared to show you his unfinished and imperfect work. It feels like you’ve been doing this for ages.

“I told you I’m a bit rusty, I…”

“Oh, don’t say that,” he interrupts with a smile, letting his hands show his face again. “You’re a classically trained pianist, 15-plus years of music classes under your belt, three years of being a trainee with top marks in songwriting. You can’t say you’re rusty when I hear you playing my piano at home. You’re not. At all,” he emphasizes as you continue to laugh at his reaction.

“Yeah, but I have almost zero experience in music production. And I also gave up being an idol so…” You try to argue, but he’s not having any of it.

“I bet you my new piano you have at least 13 ideas for this, I just feel like you do.”

There’s a smirk on his face now you can’t resist.

“Where are the lyrics you wrote for this?” You ask and Yoongi soon hands you a notepad with many lines scribbled on the first page. “Can you hand me that pen?”

Read more ›› masterlist

[letterboxd]

How I Letterboxd #12: Joe Lynch.

Self-described cinedork and Mayhem filmmaker Joe Lynch tells Horrorville’s Brett Petersel about cinematic sausage, getting to direct Creepshow episodes and being a three-star starter on Letterboxd.

“Even when I watch what I would think is a real stinker, I also consider that there were many people involved in that film who didn’t walk on set going ‘okay people, let’s screw this up today!’” —Joe Lynch

It is always a pleasure to find film directors lurking on Letterboxd. Joe Lynch is a bona fide, OG member, having racked up more than 1,500 diary entries, giving half-star reviews to his own work, and creating lists of the movies that have influenced the making of his films.

There are the films that were in Lynch’s subconscious when he made Mayhem, a workplace splatter led by Steven Yeun and Samara Weaving. There are the movies he watched while researching the Salma Hayek-starring Everly. And this just in: films that influenced The Right Snuff, one of Lynch’s two episodes for the new Creepshow series—based on the 1982 horror-comedy classic and its sequels—which premieres on Shudder April 15.

Like so many of us, Lynch took time during the pandemic to catch up on films he had neglected to watch in spite of a previous career as a video-store clerk (a Criterion Channel subscription helped him get on top of the backlog). In this edition of ‘How I Letterboxd’, Lynch discusses how those classics have informed his craft, who his Letterboxd faves are, and why the horror genre is the future of the industry.

Steven Yeun and Samara Weaving in Joe Lynch’s ‘Mayhem’ (2017).

How long have you been on Letterboxd? Joe Lynch: I remember when Letterboxd was in its beta phase way back in good ol’ 2012 and I couldn’t wait to sign up, breathlessly waiting for an invite to the party. At the time, I had a digital database where I would log movies I’ve seen, but it was always subject to whatever laptop or device I had handy and would just be a mess of titles with no rhyme or reason.

When a member follows you, what should they expect? I put it right up top in my description: “I am not a critic”, just a lover of cinema. At first I didn’t want to write “reviews” in the description, especially since I first started using the service whilst in the throes of a horrible experience making a film that I thought would bury me and I’d never work again. I was like, and I still feel this way, “who am I to rip on a movie when someone can throw it right back at me? Like ‘dude, you directed Knights of Badassdom, sit down’.”

I’ve always had the highest regard for filmmakers who can get anything made. So even when I watch what I would think is a real stinker, I also consider that there were many people involved in that film who didn’t walk on set going “okay people, let’s screw this up today!” but instead were trying their best and circumstances just got in the way, which always happens. Having made a few films and TV now, I’m fully aware of the trials and tribulations that go into making a movie and have all the respect in the world for anyone who can steer that ship to completion. It’s hard making movies and even harder making one that is your original vision [and] that is widely embraced by an audience.

I have very weird tastes so don’t be shocked if you glance at my recent activity and you see Casablanca, The Silence of the Lambs or Bigger Than Life right next to The Legend of Billie Jean, Con Air or Candyman 3. I’m usually bouncing all over the place in terms of what kinds of movies I’m screening. From films recommended to me, to films that I may be watching for research, or even just how I’m feeling that day and maybe need a good laugh or a good cry or to be scared stiff. I like that kind of variety. There’s something out there for everyone and every emotion. If anything, I’d say expect the unexpected when it comes to my viewing habits.

What’s your favorite feature to use and why? One of the residual effects of working at video stores as a kid was my desire to siphon people’s tastes in movies and possibly recommend films to others as well, so my favorite feature is the ease of use in logging films and being able to quickly recall those films as well in the event someone asks me “what’s something I should watch?”. Getting older, the “employee’s picks” in my head is getting a little harder to cross-reference than usual so to have the ability to whip out my phone and say “oh man, I just watched Possession and it was awesome!” is exponentially helpful to a cinedork like myself.

‘Big Trouble in Little China’ (1986)—a five-star film says Joe Lynch.

How do you rate the films you watch? For example, what type of film is worthy of a five-star review? Funny, I always start out on three-stars mainly because I’m so proud of the filmmakers actually getting it completed! I’ve been there! I’m somewhat biased in my reflections because I’m always rooting for the artists and from there, it’s usually gauged on both an emotional level and a technical level. I always get made fun of while watching movies because I can point out hidden cuts or when a shot is reversed but [I’m] not trying to point out flaws, it's just how my brain is wired at this point. When you pull the curtain back enough to see how the cinematic sausage is made, it's harder and harder to objectively watch a movie without trying to dissect how it was done. I try so hard to shut that part of my brain off to just passively enjoy a movie but it’s tough. I usually skew towards the positive.

The films I’ve given five-stars are movies that have continually affected me over the years and have inspired me as a person and a filmmaker, which is everything from The Empire Strikes Back, Dawn of the Dead and When Harry Met Sally... to Big Trouble in Little China, The Blob, The Last of the Mohicans. I looked back at my five-stars and it’s mostly movies that made a significant impression on me from an early age and continue to do so, maybe even more so as I get older and I view these movies in a different light.

The anthology show Creepshow returns to Shudder this month. Tell us about the two episodes you directed for the series, ‘Pipe Screams’ and ‘The Right Snuff’. Both Creepshow and Creepshow 2 were important films in my youth and even today, they were some of the first movies I remember where I wasn’t quite sure if I was supposed to be scared or laugh. These films proclaimed we could do both! As a disciple of George A. Romero, Stephen King and Tom Savini, Creepshow really shaped how I watched movies and how I made them—consider the anthology I did a few years back, Chillerama, as a prime example. So when Shudder announced the show, I had to do everything on my part to convince them I could take the baton from these masters of the macabre and do them and the many fans proud.

To come to the table and say “I want ‘The Right Snuff’ to feel like 2001: A Space Odyssey crashed into The Andromeda Strain, and ‘Pipe Screams’ is my homage to The Blob and Delicatessen”—and then everyone just immediately getting it—was a dream. Between the casts I was lucky enough to work with and the amazing crew, especially the FX geniuses at KNB, it really was one of those dream jobs I’ll never forget. I hope audiences dig the madness we conjured up on those!

Season 2 of the Shudder series ‘Creepshow’ returns to the horror streamer this month. A third season has been ordered.

If you were to expand the Mayhem universe, what would it look like? We tried! I pitched the producers the idea of the ID-7 virus in other locations and situations because in essence the idea of being uninhibited by mental and emotional constraints is so ripe. My favorite was the idea that it would get loose in a Wal-Mart or a mall on Black Friday when consumers swarm to these department stores for the best deals. You’ve seen the videos, it’s just mass hysteria. The footage already out there would have been perfect to use already and those people aren’t even infected!

Sadly it didn’t come to pass, mainly because they asked “how do we get Steven and Samara back?” and I didn’t want to force those characters into that scenario, Die Hard 2 style. Plus they’re both huge stars now and likely unavailable for the next twelve years. But the ideas people have thrown out to me show that it was impactful enough to warrant variant scenarios in a “what if?” way that’s really exciting. Who knows, maybe the ID-7 virus could find its way onto the set of a movie production…

What excites you about the future of filmmaking, especially in horror films? The world is embracing new faces and voices more than ever and it means we’re getting stories that may not have ever had the chance to flourish and be seen and heard before. For the longest time the system was much more rigid because executives and producers thought that the audience was much less accepting of a wider world view in cinema and I think the last ten years has proven them wrong. There shouldn’t be any more “token” character or “strong [insert non-white-male] character” descriptions in development meetings. I hear it less and less, which is great because that’s not our world and since cinema—especially horror—is and always should be a reflection of our culture and times, it should reflect these evolutions as well.

When I made Wrong Turn 2: Dead End, the discussions over how one of the characters—a Black character played by Texas Battle—survived at the end was not in the original script but I pushed for it mainly because it was rare for the Black character to do so in a horror film. That shouldn’t be an anomaly! Why can’t there be a ‘final guy’ or have the survivors be LGBT+ or a POC and not the usual stereotypes?

I think now it’s more commonplace to see this and it excites me for the future of the genre that artists are being more welcome to express themselves without it feeling like it’s a gimmick or a twist on the norm.

I think generations of kids growing up with horror now are gonna see these strides in the storytelling—and who’s telling the stories—and push it even further. Places like Netflix and Shudder are willing to take chances with new voices more than the studio system, now more than ever, and that’s only going to produce some great stories now and in the future.

Erica Leehrsen and Texas Battle in a scene from ‘Wrong Turn 2: Dead End’ (2007).

How has the pandemic affected your creativity and influenced your work moving forward? Aside from losing a bunch of gigs due to the shutdown and being delayed on shooting Creepshow—which was a blessing in disguise considering the time we took to further develop the scripts and design of each episode—one of the main effects of the pandemic was how it gave many of us the time to catch up on a lot of films, mainly older ones. As you’d see from my diary entries on this very site, my viewing habits changed from a lot of modern films in that rat-race of catching up with the latest release, to mainly watching films I loved in the past and a lot of ’40s to ’70s films that I never got around to.

We have the tendency as film lovers to keep a mental list of films we’ll eventually get around to as if we have all the time in the world, but with the threat of the apocalypse and no real new content coming our way at the usual rapid clip, it was so gratifying to buy an annual subscription to Criterion Channel and start watching films like The Old Dark House, The Crimson Kimono, Contempt and many others.

All of these films impacted how I view film now and have bled into future projects I’m working on—especially on the technical side, when the world wasn’t influenced vicariously through MTV coverage and letting scenes play out in masters or longer takes, relishing in the performance or the mise-en-scéne. So, silver linings!

Before we go, who are some of your favorite follows on Letterboxd? I’m a big fan of Sean Baker, who I’ve known for almost 20 years now! We worked together in NYC and I was already a big Greg the Bunny fan but our mutual appreciation for fringe and exploitation films, especially international horror and genre films, seems to have bonded us for life. I love when he posts what he’s watching. Even if he’s just saying he screened something on Blu or streaming, his thoughts on cinema are always enjoyable and engaging.

In the same breath, filmmaker Jim Cummings has the best perspective on modern filmmaking and he’s clearly a big fan of using Letterboxd, so whenever I see peers like them using the app it makes me feel less like an obsessive movie dork myself, who should be getting back to work.

Some of the other follows I really enjoy are cineastes like Elric Kane and Brian Saur, who are the hosts of the New Beverly podcast Pure Cinema. Writers Anya Stanley, David Chen, Walter Chaw and Lindsay Blair Goeldner, musician and filmmaker Brendon Small, writer and critic Brian Tallerico, author Glenn Kenny, filmmaker Rodman Flender—just to name a few people who clearly love film and love sharing their thoughts on films in a very thoughtful way.

More times than not, I’m getting some great advice for what to watch next in my “new from friends” section! Because, like being at the video store, it’s casual conversations like the ones on Letterboxd that I love and always steering me to new films or revisiting old ones with a new perspective.

Related content

Joe’s film influences for ‘The Right Snuff’ Creepshow episode

The Video Store: Hollie Horror’s list of horror films with memorable scenes in video stores

Office Workplace Horror: J Cara’s list of office horror and workplace thrillers

Follow Brett on Letterboxd

Follow Horrorville—the home for horror on Letterboxd

[cosplayinamerica]

ARTIST ALLEY : BurntGreenTea

Here at Cosplay in America, I am expanding who I interview to those in the convention scene. Today we will talk to BurntGreenTea who I met in artist alley at Ikkicon, an anime convention in Austin, TX. BurntGreenTea is from Northern California and as stated on his Deviant Art “Hey, my name is Nelson! I like to draw waifus”

EJEN : My first question is why BurntGreenTea? 

BURNTGREENTEA: That’s actually my second handle I came up with, I had an embarrassing name before so I wanted to change into something more ironic and more “me” in a name. so I’ve been going as BurntGreenTea ever since. I do drink matcha alot!

EJEN: Tell us how you got started in artist alley, what was your first one and what was that experience like?

BURNTGREENTEA: I started getting interested in doing artist alley at my first Fanime Con back in 2007 as a one day attendee when I was still in high school.

I went with my best friend at the time and it blew my expectations of what a convention was, especially the artist alley since it completely opened my mind that there’s artists actually selling fan art. But I didn’t commit to it until 2012, just when I was in my 2nd year of college.

By that time, I had enough digital art and felt confident that I could do it. Fanime still had the application process of first come first serve (meaning those who apply the earliest will get a spot), so I was fortunate enough to apply fast enough to get a table!

For a first time experience it was nerve-wracking before, during and after the con. But there was something to it that really sparked my interest; and I think there were people that legitimately liked my work and bought them.

EJEN: Was there a point that you went “yeah, this could work” and you made the jump to traveling out of state for artist alley?

BURNTGREENTEA: It was about one and half years after I graduated from college, between that time I worked in a job that was soul sucking but I had many of my colleagues working at, and then after I was applying to animation studios, gaming companies, etc while I was doing commissions and artist alleys at the same time.

It went on like this for almost a year. By this point I felt like I really hit my lowest and felt a great shame that I couldn’t find “stable” work. My parents didn’t really support me doing artist alley during this time since it’s not legit work and it’s more like a fun hobby I can do on the side, all the while I have colleagues and friends who have jobs in the animation or gaming industries. I felt extremely lost, and wasn’t sure the direction I wanted to go in life, so my parents encouraged me to go back to school to get a “safe” degree or trade.

But there was something I knew in the back of my mind that I couldn’t see until I had a meet up with an old friend. She was confident, happy, found her dream job that paid well and she enjoyed the work, and she was completely honest and blunt. When the topic came up of me being lost in life, she asked me, “what did you want to do then?” and I told her honestly, “I really just want to do artist alley and make that work.” “Then just do it.” So I did.

EJEN: After all the time you spent in artist alley, what’s the most important factor that an artist must understand to do decently in sales

BURNTGREENTEA: Research research research. It’s basically “knowledge is power” but breaking down as knowing your audience, yourself (what you enjoy, your strengths and capabilities) and learning new trades while breaking old habits.

EJEN: Can you go more in detail about research, research, research?

BURNTGREENTEA: So this reflects back on my previous answer, so know the convention you’re going into, what you can offer, what’s your budget, everything that would make your experience at the convention you’re getting into a great experience.

I have heard many stories of artists not breaking even and even I had bad experiences due to inaccurate/outdated information or inexperience. For example, there was a first year event that had a $1000 table price tag and promised to bring in 5000 attendees.

This was going to be my second event/convention to table at, so I had no idea what it was going to be like and decided to go for it. It ended up having less than 100 attendees, and I lost a significant amount of money. So now I have to get as much info as I can get to make the convention viable to go to.

EJEN: How do you describe your style and how has it changed if any over the 14 years you’ve done art? What were some of your earlier influences.

BURNTGREENTEA: Right now I can say it’s pretty much anime style, but I can say there were several phases I went through. Looking through my Deviantart gives a great timeline all the way back to middle school until recently.

When I initially started I was getting into anime thanks to friends, so I was very much influenced by Naruto, Full Metal Alchemist, and Gurren Lagann. Then in high school I started to do more digital art, eventually creating artwork bigger and grander just like the artists from Fanime I admired.

When I finally started my education in my art program in college, I started getting the proper training in lighting, form, and composition. This time period my pieces were more western-influenced, like more realistic faces and body proportions, but there was something missing in it that I wouldn’t understand until after I graduated. It’s around the same time when I wanted to do artist alleys full time that I was more true to myself in the style and got more flashy, more colorful and composition.

EJEN : How do you decide what Alley to apply for. What’s your personal criteria for conventions to do artist alley at? 

BURNTGREENTEA: Local cons are usually easy for me to decide to apply for due to the cost being low(transportation, housing, etc). If there’s anything that involves flying out of state, I have to factor in much more information about the con, personal experiences from other artists, and if it is viable for an anime fan artist to break even and also turn a profit. Usually big conventions like Anime Expo and Otakon are the must go to conventions for their huge attendance numbers.

EJEN: Describe to me a typical day in the Alley!

BURNTGREENTEA: Due to the times right now, it seems like almost a dream to be in an artist alley, haha. Here’s a usual day of being in the Alley: Waking up early to get ready, getting breakfast and caffeine before heading inside a convention.

Usually getting there early, either me or some art friends would walk around the Alley and check out other artists before it’s open to the public. There would be some art friends I made along the way that I can catch up with briefly, chatting about the next shows or projects. I would have probably stayed up kinda late working on physical commissions and would need to go back to my table to continue finishing them up.

When the Alley opens up, it’s mostly engaging and talking with familiar customers or friends, while also working on commissions during the down times. Friends would go on food or snack runs, and I would get an hour to go shopping during the day somewhere as a break.

By the time it ends, it would have felt like it had gone in a flash. But with heavy eyes but our hearts full with a day accomplished. If we had the strength, we would check out an event or explore the convention hall abit more to absorb the atmosphere. Getting dinner with friends after a job well done, while we have another day to look forward to spending time with fans alike.

It’s really nostalgic to reflect on a typical day to be in the Alley, and having to have that all stop for almost a year now.

EJEN: Since the pandemic, how are you coping with this change both personally and business-wise?

BURNTGREENTEA: I was honestly hoping conventions would come back around at the end of May, but that never happened so I had to approach things differently. Luckily I had a freelance gig that I was working part time, so I had a semi-regular income on the side while I applied for virtual conventions and commissions.

It was tough since I wanted 2020 to be the year I would do the most conventions ever but that plan derailed. I also focused on my online shop and my social media presence, which so far is paying off!

Like everyone this year took a mental and physical toll, but I also ended up working on more projects and digital work to help keep me distracted.

EJEN: What are your plans for the future, what are you working on?

BURNTGREENTEA: My goal is still to go back to doing conventions, but at the moment I’m going to give that a pause. Currently I have a contract job that’s ending soon, and I have something that’s NDA that might come up, crossing my fingers! That’s the near future, but for the time being I want to refocus on learning new things and refining my art since I’ve gotten rusty.

EJEN: Finally who is your waifu?

BURNTGREENTEA: My waifu is Lucina from Fire Emblem!

Visit BurntGreenTea’s Etsy!

[chixibrown]

Upon finishing the Stardew Valley comic

Since the Stardew Valley comic has been released by Fangamer, I am now able to write about what I had been doing in secret for one long year.

■ Gratitude

First of all, to the original creator Eric-san who entrusted the task in my hands, to Kari-san who helped me from early development all the way to printing, to Ryan-san, to Steven-san who did the translations, to Kari-san's mother who assisted in the creation of the envelope, to Erica-san for product photography -- And last but not least, everyone at Fangamer and FangamerJP.

It's thanks to the support of many people that I was able to finish the comic, and I wish to extend my sincerest gratitude towards everyone involved.

■ Chronology

"Chihiro! Big News! Let's create a new merch together!" was a request that I received around autumn of 2018. At first I was wondering if I was going to be asked to design a T-shirt, but turned out to be an invitation to draw a comic book!

At that time, I was posting comics on Twitter at random. Not even in my wildest dreams have I thought that my little comics would be appreciated so, and thus I immediately burst into tears.

I'm very honored and thankful for the opportunity to pen Fangamer's very first comic.

■ Contents

I'll try not to spoil anything about the story in this section.

The content requested by the original creator Eric-san for the comic was: "The story before the farmer comes to the farm" "With focus on the community center and Joja" "And the protagonist should have no set characteristics"

These were really the ONLY information that we received from Eric-san throughout the whole process (whyyy).

I was definitely worried. In reality, for around six months when I did my preliminary research, I played Stardew Valley every day, took countless pictures, and absorbed myself in collecting materials.

I I ended up taking a little over 20 thousand screenshots total (lol).

I wholeheartedly agree with Eric-san's guideline not to give the protagonist any set characteristics. I think one of the keypoints of this game is that "Anyone can be the protagonist".

The story is set from a few years before the prologue of game, so I was rather careful not to show my own personal interpretation. In principle, the actions of the characters were mostly taken from their in-game dialogue where they mention having done something in the past (For example, the reason Sam got in trouble lmao).

It took a lot of effort outlining the story, which involved things such as "Which characters would be in contact with each other?" and "Which characters may not be present at the valley at the time?". This is the reason why the preliminary research took around six months.

By the way, I was the one who proposed to include a "letter" with the comic, both as a bonus and major spoiler, in a way. But uh, many fellow Japanese may not be able to read it, so... I'll secretly tell you the what's actually written on the letter:

It's the handwritten version of THE letter you receive in the English version of the game's prologue. It's in your hands now. So in conclusion, it's probably exactly what you think it was.

I was quite adamant about how the letter needs to be handwritten. And as who wrote it... I shall keep it a secret here.

The reason why the comic had little to no dialogue is because it was the style I had back from the time I was drawing Stardew Valley fan art. Since Stardew Valley is a media not originally from Japan, that style serves to fulfill my two wishes: "I want people all over the world to be able to read my work" and "I want to cherish the feelings of each individual player" -- That sort of idea, really.

To summarize,

"I want people all over the world to be able to read my work"

"I want to preserve the unique interpretations each individual player might have"

"Anyone can become a Stardew Valley protagonist"

I drew the comic with these concepts in mind.

■ About me

I would like to talk about my experiences throughout the development of the comic.

My name is Chihiro Sakaida (a.k.a. Brown Junimo), I was already working for a game company, so I took advantage of that experience to work on game design and illustration.

Of course, while I was working on the Stardew Valley comic, I was a freelancer and had other jobs to worry about as well, so I ended up spending a lot of time working on the comic at night after work. I also studied digital art for a month for the sake of the comic, and I think it helped improved my work efficiency.

Those were truly, very fun days for me. The only thing that did bother me was the fact that even though I was working on my favorite Stardew Valley content day after day, I couldn't really share it with anyone.

I didn't want to take the risk of accidentally running my mouth on Twitter, and I no longer had the time to draw and post online like I used to -- So I had to resort to posting only low-risk tweets, so to speak, and to be honest, it was quite disheartening.

As such, I felt truly supported by the trusted individuals who knew about the comic. Tori-san, Aki-san, Kari-san, and Ryan-san, thank you so, so much.

■ Those who supported me

Tori-san is my partner, and also a person I respect as a novelist and screenwriter. She kindly and carefully reviewed and summarized my messy story.

Aki-san knew about the comic existed, but also knew next to nothing about it. Because of that, I think it was more than a handful to support me. It must've been really hard on Aki-san, who didn't know the contents of the book and thus had no way to accidentally spoiling the surprise, but whom also probably held even more feelings of shame than I did in regards to social media... I'm sorry that you've had to put up with so much. I was very proud to have you be the first reader of the finished book.

Kari-san is the illustrator of the Official Stardew Valley Guide Book, and I respect her a whole lot.

Both her work are her personality are very kind and easy-going. Together with her partner Ryan-san, she's managed to assist and encourage me many, many times.

No matter what I drew, I was sure to be greeted with her "Chihiro, you're so great!" or "Chihiro, you really did your best!" (Even my own mother have never praise me this much!) Overall, she feels just like an older sister I've always longed for, and it makes me very happy.

No matter what merch was in the process of being created, she would say "Let's make a brown one!!", solely because it's my signature color. It makes me very happy, although probably a tiny bit embarrassed as well to have her value my one schtick this much. She's even came to Japan many times, and listened to me talk all day long. After all, I wouldn't have been able to get this job to begin with if it wasn't for Kari-san, so she's a real lifesaver.

I didn't get to talk directly with Eric-san, the original creator and developer of Stardew Valley. Obviously I received some feedback via Fangamer, but I was refraining from being in contact with him as much as possible. I didn't think I could convey my full sincerity towards him before the comic was completed. I strived to be able to earnestly understand the feelings he wanted to convey via his own words -- Whether it was the game dialogues, his words on the developer blog and interviews, etc.

There was, by the way, no revision whatsoever to the comic. Eric-san did, however, carefully check all of my ideas and always provided words of appreciation; which made me happier than anything else. Those words became my motivation to live, in a sense, which in turn allowed me to freely and happily work on the comic.

■ Going Forward

While I've been talking about how proud I am to have finished the comic, I also would like to talk about what's coming next. While I certainly plan to continue working with Fangamer for the foreseeable future, at the same time, I have also decided to work for another game development company, and I plan to devote my time working on game development for at least the next year.

It has been my dream for the past 15 years to work for this particular company, and I'm elated to see it come true.

However, as a result I think I will have less exposure to social media. I don't think it's going to be easy to recreate that warm and wondrous time where I could interact with people regularly, but my memory of that time is something I will treasure for the rest of my life.

I'm really sorry that I have absolutely nothing to give back, but I sincerely hope the comic has brought a smile to everyone who's read or even merely noticed it.

■ Finally

I'm such a fortunate person -- I've come this far due to everyone's support, and for that, I would also like to extend my deepest gratitude. Thank you so much, for everything, always.

It would delight me if all of you could stay with me from this point on.

As I try to polish my skills and improve myself as a whole.

PS: Thanks to my best friend Ryou-chan for translating this!

[pheedraws]

What exactly is painting digitally and what goes into it?

Okay, so... in its simplest form, digital art is a form of art in which digital technology is used either during its creation or the presentation of said work upon completion. 

People do digital art in many different ways, as there is an abundance of software and programmes to choose from! I, personally, paint using Photoshop and a Wacom Intuos tablet to emulate what I would be doing with a pen or pencil on paper if drawing traditionally, because that is what works best for me! (Some people choose to paint with computer mouses instead, and those people should be both respected and feared as the powerful beings they are)

What goes into painting digitally? 

Like traditional art (as in, art done physically with physical mediums), everyone has their own way of producing digital art. I’ve outlined my personal process below the cut, using the ever-fabulous Mr Russo as a willing model... 

My digital painting process consists of 3 stages: 

Line Art: sketching out the ‘outline’ of a piece, starts out rough and messy and is (eventually) tidied up, this is usually the part that takes me the longest.

Flat Colours: then I lay down the flat colours, turning them into ‘clipping masks’ so I can go absolutely wild in the next stage and not have to worry about staying within my lines. 

Rendering / Shading: by far the most fun part of the process; go wild! have fun! add as many colours as you want to build depth and show light & shadow!

Just as you’d carefully select artistic tools and equipment that best suit you and your artistic style when painting/drawing traditionally, the same can be said for digital painting. Brushes are what you use within digital art programmes to draw lines and colour things in, and brush choice is important!! Each digital art software comes with ‘standard’ brushes, but based on my own experience... they’re not good for everything. 

The good news, though? There are thousands upon thousands of (free!!) brush packs online to choose from! Experiment with them!! Go wild!! Find what works best for you, and digital art can be so much fun!

I’ve never agreed with artists being secretive over which brush packs they use, so I will always be willing to share what I work with; my all-time favourite pack can be found here and almost all of my pieces are done using it these days. 

I hope this was of some use to you, and I’m sorry I got a little carried away in my answer! I am firmly in the ‘digital art is just as valid as other art forms’ camp, so I’ll always be willing to answer questions about artistic processes and other topics! 

Thanks for showing interest in my work!!