#wasn't aiming for a particular style with this one

[turquoisephoenix]

“It has risen again! Sir Daniel Fortesque! The Hero of Gallowmere who fell at the first charge!”

Mad at myself for not playing MediEvil sooner because this game is everything I want in a video game. Also gave me HUGE Dragon’s Lair vibes so I just had to take the fake cel approach at my first stab at drawing Sir Dan, who is just the best. No wonder I’ve seen fanart of this guy pop up from time to time, what a cool character that asks the question “what if a reanimated corpse was the most bullied man in town”.

[avatar-anna]

The One About the Documentary

i watched part one of the yolanda and selena documentary so you don't have to...and it pissed me tf off. anyway enjoy!

Harry Styles x Latina! Reader Masterlist

When his girlfriend asked to watch the documentary, Harry said yes, but hesitantly.

In all honesty, Harry didn't think Y/n would have any desire to watch it, but at eight o'clock sharp, she was on the couch armed with a bowl of popcorn and two bottles of coke, one for him and one for her.

"Can I ask why we're—"

"Shh! It's starting."

Harry settled into the couch, his arm around his girlfriend, whose eyes were glued to the TV the second the documentary began.

*.*

"So Yolanda's the only one who knew about this alleged affair?" Y/n said to no one in particular. "Yeah fucking right. I hope Chris Perez never watches this."

Harry covered his hand with his mouth to hide his grin. His girlfriend had a knack for talking about people she didn't know as if they were good friends.

Taking a handful of popcorn out of the bowl, he kissed Y/n's cheek. "I don't imagine anyone close to Selena is watching this."

Huffing, Y/n slumped back against Harry's side, angrily chewing popcorn. "I hate her," she grumbled, and he knew she wasn't talking about Selena.

Playing with a strand of her hair, he turned his attention back to the TV. "I know."

*.*

"¿Un accidente? ¿Fue un accidente?" Y/n all but shouted at the screen. Her brows were narrowed in an adorable glare, nose slightly crinkled in anger. "Are you kidding me? You shot her! In the back! Twice!"

Harry debated whether to intervene or stay seated on the couch. His hand reached for the bowl of popcorn in the meantime, taking a handful as he watched his girlfriend shout at Yolanda Saldivar.

"Lovey, maybe we should turn it off," he ended up saying.

Her head whipped around, her glare landing on Harry, though he knew it wasn't aimed at him. "Why?"

Why? he thought. Because you hate Yolanda and I'm not sure my arm can take anymore angry punches.

"You seem a little...heated?"

Y/n's eyes blazed. "Of course I'm heated! This whole thing is bullshit!"

Harry knew his girlfriend was passionate, it was one of the things he loved about her. And one thing Y/n happened to be passionate about was Selena Quintanilla Perez.

"I know that, and you know that, so why are we watching this?"

Y/n had sent numerous messages about the documentary in question when word first got out that it would be released. Fiery texts about how ridiculous it was that someone so horrible was making a documentary after all these years, about how no one would ever be stupid enough to take Yolanda's side, and so on. Harry, of course, was inclined to agree, but he also thought Y/n was merely ranting about the trailer. He didn't think they'd be sitting down to watch it. Honestly, he thought his girlfriend wouldn't have given it the time of day.

"I—I don't know, but I can't just not finish it," Y/n said. "I'm watching in protest."

Swallowing a laugh, Harry pulled his girlfriend back onto the couch. "Okay, then, lovey. Then sit down and let's finish it."

*.*

"Oh come on, Yolanda," Harry groaned, his voice nearly reaching Y/n's frustrated levels. "If all this evidence has been sitting in some storage unit for all these years, why is it only coming out now?"

Y/n was practically bouncing in her seat on the couch as the woman in question spoke. She shook Harry's shoulder with her hands, but he was used to it by now. This was a normal occurrence for any movie night.

"That's my point!" Y/n said. "She's evil. She'll be hard pressed to find an unbiased jury when it's time for her parole."

"You think she'll really be let out on parole?"

Y/n shrugged, her eyes on the television. "She'd probably be safer in solitary."

"Y/n!"

"What? It's the truth!"

*.*

"¡Bruja! ¡Mentirosa! Who the fuck is buying this? You admitted! ¡Me cago en la reputísima madre que te parió la reconcha de tu—"

"Aaand that's where we'll stop," Harry said, turning the TV off with a definitive click of the remote.

"Wha—Why? It's almost done!"

Harry ignored Y/n's protests and took her into his arms, taking her away from the TV and the couch and the popcorn, which she'd begun to throw at the screen in outrage. As he took the stairs up to their room, Y/n turned to begging, promising she'd behave and stop throwing popcorn, but Harry was having none of it.

"This is for your own good, lovey," he said. "It's not healthy to be angry like that."

"Oh, so I'm being irrational?"

Harry merely rolled his eyes. "Now you know I didn't say that."

"Well...You're...Put me down! I need to finish!"

"Not tonight, lovey."

Harry set Y/n on the bed gently. She crossed her arms and glared at him, but it was half-assed, and not entirely directed at her and still at Public Enemy Number One.

She gave him the silent treatment as they got ready for bed, but Harry knew it wouldn't last. His girlfriend had a short fuse, but the emphasis was on short. Y/n didn't stay mad for very long, she never had as long as he knew her. Harry gave it until he got to the second chapter of his book and the silent treatment would come to an end.

It took the third, but Harry smiled a little as Y/n held hos cheek in her hand and kissed the other. "I'm not gonna apologize for being angry," she said.

"I wouldn't expect you to. I know how you feel about Yolanda Saldivar."

Y/n hummed. "But, I apologize for the popcorn. And the excessive profanity. And for bruising your shoulder."

Setting his book down, Harry looked at his girlfriend, nothing but affection—and perhaps mild amusement—in his gaze. "It's okay. I hardly felt a thing."

"Liar," Y/n giggled. "But thank you for putting up with...I don't know, me, I guess."

Harry took that as his opportunity to kiss her properly. Y/n squeaked in surprise, cradling his face gingerly as he slotted his lips over hers. Laying her down properly on the bed, he hovered over her, his hand running along her bare thigh and up past her night gown. Because Y/n was the kind of woman who wore little nightgowns before bed.

That was how Harry knew she wasn't totally mad at him. She wore one of her shorter, more revealing ones. She had a couple that went down to her calves that weren't expressly for when she was pissed at Harry, but he knew—though the joke was on her, he thought she looked just as sexy in those.

Y/n wrapped her legs around Harry's waist, her arms twining around his neck as he kissed the shell of her ear, the curve of her jaw. "It's not 'putting up with,' lovey," he murmured. "You should know that by now. If anyone puts up with anyone in this relationship it's you."

Leaning up on her elbows, Y/n made Harry look her in the eye. "So we're both a little crazy. That's nothing new."

Harry just grinned down at his girl, admiring the soft look in her eyes, the amused arch of her brow, her swollen lips, and chest that breathed heavily. Y/n might have had a short temper, she might throw popcorn at the TV when it made her mad, and she might curse and hit him when she felt particularly outraged, but she put up with all of his quirks with a smile too, loved him for every single one. Harry took up most of their shared closet space—which he had a weird thing about color coding—he had a tendency to talk in his sleep, he had to sit on the same side of the couch and made Y/n move if she was sitting on it (though now she knew better), he often scraped the bottom of the rice pot into the sink before Y/n could save her favorite crunchy parts which drove her nuts, and he had the unfortunate habit of leaving the cap off his toothpaste.

And there was the whole no-privacy thing because of his job, but that wasn't much of a quirk.

"I'm cool with it if you are."

Y/n smiled. "So you'll watch part two with me?"

"Hell no. But I will support you if you decide to scream at Yolanda and her fucked up family through the TV a second time."

"You're gonna regret that," Y/n said as she began to run her hands down Harry's broad shoulders. "Selena. Morning and night. Every minute of every day."

"That's...not a threat, lovey."

Y/n pouted. "Shit, you're right. I'll...only speak Spanish around you so you never know what I'm saying."

Harry's grin widened as he leaned down to kiss her collarbone. "I don't think you realize how sexy you sound, even when you're cross with me. Or your arch nemesis, for that matter."

"Well then I'll—"

"Face it, lovey. There's very little you could use to threaten me," he said, dragging the words over her neck. "Now let me love on you a bit before bed."

"What if I said no?" she asked, even though they both knew she wouldn't. Y/n just liked to be contrary for the sake of it.

"Well that would just be cruel to the both of us, wouldn't it?"

Finally relenting, Y/n slumped back against the bed, bringing Harry with her. She held the back of his head, her grip firm as she brought his lips to hers once more. Harry hummed triumphantly against her mouth, savoring the taste of her on his tongue. They eventually found themselves tangled together, Harry on his back while he hugged Y/n close to his chest. One hand was buried deep in her hair while the other kept a steady grip on her waist. He already knew each little sound she made, each reaction burned time and time again into his mind. But he collected each sigh, each graze of teeth like it was the first time, savoring it like this would be his only opportunity to ever kiss her.

Infatuated. He was infatuated with her. He loved when Y/n was loud and bright and opinionated, and he loved when she was shy and demure and unsure of herself. He loved the way she said his name when she was exasperated by something he did, and he was obsessed with the way she sometimes started speaking in another language without realizing it. He loved the way she loved him, so confidently, so tenderly—he loved that each devouring kiss seemed to say that she was just as infatuated as he was, that he wasn't alone in these intense feelings.

"Love you, bubba," Y/n murmured, the words getting tangled in their kiss.

"Love you," he replied.

It was all there really was to say.

[tnbscans]

Kazuhiko Tamura & Masakazu Katsura NYCC 2012 Interview

This is transcribed from the video included on the second season 1 Viz blu-ray set.

Tamura: Not many adults watch anime anymore. Those who do watch always will, but I wanted something with wider appeal, like a foreign TV drama. As we moved in that direction, I began thinking about "heroes." When I was little, our first real manga hero was Wingman created by Katsura-sensei. Before that, they were all tokusatsu or live-action. That's what made me think Katsura-sensei was the one fort he job.

Katsura: A friend of mine called. Takayuki Takeya (Note: He created Wingman figurines produced by Bandai), a figurine artist. He asked me if I wanted to design characters for an anime series. At the time, I was working on Zetman, a dark manga series about heroes. If it was going to be similar, I wasn't too interested. But he said it was a comedy, with a middle-aged man as the lead. That sounded interesting, so I accepted the offer.

Tamura: We wanted to create characters that people could relate to. Main characters in anime are usually young boys and girls. There aren't many successful anime with a middle-aged character as the lead. Since Tiger & Bunny features two main characters, we thought it'd be interesting if we make one of them a bit older and make it more relatable to adults. Like, "Daddy's really working hard!" That's what we were aiming for. During the planning stages, we just had very rough, one or two-line descriptions for each character. We gave Katsura-sensei total freedom to come up with his own ideas.

Katsura: "Freedom" is a nice way to put it - they just dumped it all on me. It was so random. It was like, "This character uses ice, uses fire, or the wind." Or like, "Kotetsu has strong punches." That's all that written down. What am I supposed to do, right? So it was very difficult.

Tamura: Couldn't have done it without you.

Katsura: Bandai wanted to come out with a toy line. They wanted to come out with eight figures together with the show, right? So they wanted me to design the heroes really quickly.

Tamura: Maybe it seemed like this was a project about toys to you.

Katsura: It really did seem that way. No details at all were set at that time. The concept was for them to advertise companies...

Tamura: Like walking ads.

Katsura: Yeah, like walking ads. The more they stand out, the better. They get more points. When we were kids, we thought it was so cool how Ultraman's and Masked Rider's eyes glowed at night. That's why I wanted to make them glow. I thought it'd be great if their entire bodies glowed like neon lights. Also, I gave them colors so they wouldn't be lost against the scenery. That's why the heroes in the series are so showy. Take Sky High, for example, I designed him in an art deco style. I tried to create the coolest possible design within that style. Even the angle of the fins...

Tamura: The angle of the fins? I think you revised them seven times.

Katsura: These? After looking at the CG?

Tamura: No, no. Your revisions to the lines of the fine on his legs. The length...

Katsura: I did that?

Tamura: Yes, you did. That's how particular you were.

Katsura: I was very particular. On everything.

Tamura: And the colors...silver and champagne gold...

Katsura: The patterns on Fire Emblem's chest, too...

Tamura: You changed that design a lot. Because his first submissions are so great, we tell him, "Let's go with this!" But then he'll say, "Actually, I want to fix it a little." He didn't like a certain angle, and things like that.

Katsura: Or I'd email him out of the blue and say, "Please change it to this."

Tamura: Yeah...

Katsura: I submitted the design for Tiger, but decided I wanted to change it, so I asked them to redo it.

Tamura: Yes, we had to redo the CG.

Katsura: Yeah...

Tamura: That's why Tiger in the promo looks different from the show when you look closely.

Katsura: I gave them a lot of headaches.

Tamura: But Tiger's overall design didn't change.

Katsura: No, just the details. I do that a lot in my other works, as well. If I don't like something I've drawn, I'd redo it.

Tamura: That's how particular you are.

Katsura: Well, I am very nitpicky...

Tamura: But, I think that was a good thing, though.

Katsura: Really?

Tamura: Yes. It was rough, but yes.

Katsura: I was asked to create heroes with a very distinct designs, so that was a challenge I was looking forward to. It was more fun than creating similar heroes with slight variations. So I first created categories and equally gave each one distinct design features. So I like all of then. But if I had to choose Tiger took the longest time. Until Tiger was set, I couldn't start deciding on the others. I guess my favorites are Lunatic and Tiger.

Tamura: Your use of colors was very original: white and lime-green.

Katsura: That's just because I like lime-green.

Tamura: But green has the image of a supporting character.

Katsura: True, but I never really felt that way.

Tamura: My favorites are Blue Rose and Origami Cyclone. I think they're very original.

Katsura: Really? From my perspective, I think Origami is a little cliche.

Tamura: But you know, ninja characters usually dress like ninja. But the classical Kabuki red eye makeup made him look really cool.

Katsura: In the original proposal, it said "Japan-otaku Russian." I thought i'd be humorous if he saw Japan totally in the wrong way, so I added Kabuki elements to his ninja style. Real ninja are supposed to be inconspicuous and stay hidden in the shadows, but he's showy to the hilt. And totally wrong. That's what I was aiming for. It was fun. Initially, I thought of Blue Rose as the female version of Tiger. So in the initial design, she was wearing a mask. Then I was told to make her cuter, like a pop idol, with her face showing. So I completely changed everything.

Tamura: To me, when I first saw her design...I hope Sensei won't' be offended if I say this, but she looked like a villain. But we wanted her to become popular, someone people can have fun cosplaying. And showed more skin.

Katsura: They were adamant about wanting to see her cleavage. They were very clear about that.

Tamura: Yes, we were.

Katsura: I didn't want to design someone so stereotypical, so I made her breasts actually small.

Tamura: Her gun, too.

Katsura: Like, her headpiece is the hat that nurses used to wear in old days. And her gun is in the shape of a hypodermic needle. After I created eight design categories, I couldn't decide which heroes will get assigned with design elements. I drew various possibilities, like a Sky High-type Fire Emblem and so forth. And that's how I narrowed it down. I had decided that Fire Emblem would wear a cape like American comic heroes do. I gave him a macho body with big shoulders. Along the way, I was told he's gay. So I made him wear high heels. Confident, I submitted my design. "He's supposed to be skinny," they said. Nobody told me! So I went back, made him skinnier, and that's the Fire Emblem as you know today. I was told that heroes would be drawn using CG, I thought it'd be naet if there was a moving fire pattern on his cape. So I made the suggestion casually. Later, I was told the CG artists had a hard time with it.

Tamura: Oh, they sure did. They had to redo the fire pattern so many times.

Katsura: It must've been rough.

Tamura: Yes, but I'm glad we did it.

Katsura: Yeah.

Tamura: We wanted to be true to Sensei's vision, so even if we couldn't make it perfect, we wanted to get as close to it as possible and tried repeatedly. The CG staff worked very hard.

Katsura: They sure did.  I think we were all happy with the outcome. I was told Lunatic was a detective, who was partnered with Kotetsu. And that he stepped over to the dark side. The plot I got at the time was that Kotetsu could manipulate memories. The mark on his face is the scar placed by Kotetsu when he tried to wipe Lunatic's memories of doing evil. That's what I based my design on. I don't think Lunatic works for justice at all. I don't consider him a hero. He's crazy. He can say whatever he wants, but he's not a hero of justice.

Tamura: We were striving to create an anime for adults, and this was my first time as an animation producer. We wanted to do something different than the ordinary anime. So we  asked Mr. Nishida, the screenplay writer, and Mr. Katsura to join us. And Mr. Ike for music, all of whom worked on live-action shows. I was so excited to have this opportunity and to have such a wonderful staff. I felt there was absolutely no room to screw up. I put a lot of pressure on myself. Many staff working on the show believed in the show, as well. Each of us has our own special feelings about the show. Animation is the accumulation of everyone's efforts allt he way to the end. We did have arguments and differences of opinion, but I owe it all to my staff to have been able to create this final product.

Katsura: I worked really hard designing these eight kids to the smallest detail. It would make me very happy if you would love each one of them.

Tamura: From the very beginning of the production, we wanted to show this to the world. We wanted to bring the viewers something interesting, not just in Japan, but beyond. At various events I was able to attend, including one here in New York, I learned that the show is very popular. Personally, it makes me extremely happy. And as the representative of the production staff, I am very grateful. I want the show to spread even further. Please continue to support the show. Thank you.

Katsura: I kept on working without giving a thought to the people in the studio. I felt I couldn't do my work if I thought about it.

Tamura: You're a heartless man, Sensei.

Katsura: Yes, I am.

Tamura: Were you always like that?

Katsura: Yeah, pretty much.

Tamura: So, you're petty?

Katsura: I'm gonna kill you later, okay?

Interviewer: Thank you very much!

Katsura: You say "uhh" and "umm" too much.

Interviewer: I knew you were gonna say that, Sensei!

Tamura: Can you cut those out?

[bcdrawsandwrites]

[ID: A Team Fortress 2 fanfic chapter banner in the style of the achievement icons. The RED Spy, depicted in solid orange, is standing around a corner, holding up his knife. Meanwhile, the BLU Spy, depicted with orange outlines, is approaching Pyro, preparing to backstab it. Pyro is depicted in solid orange and is preparing to fire its flare gun. The characters are against a gray background. In the bottom right corner in white text against a gray box is text reading "CHAPTER FOUR: SPIES LIKE US." /end ID]

Flickering

Fandom: Team Fortress 2 Rating: K+ Genre: Hurt/Comfort, Friendship Characters: Spy, Pyro, Medic, Heavy, plus some of the other mercs in smaller roles Warnings: General references to trauma, TF2-typical violence, panic attacks, self-harm Fic Description: After the events of the comics, the mercs try to go back to how things were, but it’s never that easy.

Spy can see his teammates going through their own struggles… but something seems to be very, very wrong with Pyro in particular.

And since no one else seems to be doing anything about this, Spy makes it his mission to get to the bottom of what is troubling Pyro. For no particular reason. Beta Readers: @mechmolar, @gonturan0, @junuve

---~~~---

Chapter 4: Spies Like Us Summary: In which Spy does some digging.

---~~~---

Spy knew he was being stared at as everyone stepped out of their vehicles and headed out to the next day's match. He pointedly did not meet their gaze until a flash of white caught his eye and he realized it was not Pyro, but Medic fixing him with a look. "What?" Spy snapped.

"I appreciate your enthusiasm, but usually I am the one to make the cuts," Medic replied, holding up his bonesaw.

It took a moment for Spy to realize what he meant, and he lowered his voice. "It was attacking me, if you must know."

"Oh, interesting." Medic rubbed his chin in thought. "Was it merely a side-effect of its pyromania, or was it actively attacking?"

"It set one of my items on fire and then attempted to grab me," Spy muttered, then gave a start. "Wait, how did you know that was me?"

Medic gingerly felt over the teeth of his bonesaw. "Not all blades cut the same way. I know the cuts your knife can make."

Spy frowned; it wasn't like it was the first time any of them had fought with each other. But something struck him, and he looked the Medic in the eyes. "You know some things about... that creature, do you not?"

"Somewhat. Why?"

Spy held his tongue for the moment—what would he even ask? It didn't matter—they were nearing the site of their next match anyway. "Nevermind," he grunted, and followed the others to spawn.

Much to Spy's irritation, he found the Pyro already there, and already staring at him. Not this again. He stared back at it, and when it did not waver, he activated his Cloak and Dagger and crept over to another part of the room. The Pyro seemed to have expected this as it crept around, searching for him, but Spy kept his distance.

Well, it seemed his momentary lack of calm hadn't deterred it. He wished he could figure out a way to communicate with it—he made a mental note to ask the Engineer for advice later.

Speaking of, Engineer was approaching Pyro. He patted it on the back to get its attention, and it whirled on him in surprise, but made no sound.

...Sound.

Spy's mind drifted back to the day prior, when he thought he might have heard a faint sound when he defended himself. Had that come from Pyro? He hadn't been entirely sure... but if it had been Pyro, it had made the noise when he'd attacked it.

Interesting.

He wasn't keen to repeat that—Medic would notice again and grow suspicious. But maybe...

"Begin!"

The mercs rushed out into the fray, Pyro following Engineer. So it was going to defend the gadgets again—it would probably be fine while the Engineer was still there, but Spy made a note to check on it later.

The match progressed as usual, and Spy of course did not twist his knife when stabbing the back of an enemy sniper that was aiming at Scout. Once he was sure Scout was able to slip into the enemy base, he turned around to check on the Pyro.

Sure enough, Pyro was defending the Engineer "nest" as fiercely as ever, if not more so. The sentry caught an enemy scout, while an air blast sent an enemy sniper's arrow sailing right back. Spy sat back, cloaked, and watched the Pyro for a moment. Ordinarily he would have been impressed at how efficiently it was defending the Engineer's gadgets and their team's intelligence, but as it stood, he found himself annoyed that no enemy was landing a hit on it, and was then annoyed at his own annoyance.

Spy heard a faint noise behind himself, looked to find nothing there, and knew what that meant.

He should have tried to attack the enemy spy himself. He should have at least called out a warning. But for the moment, he held himself back.

And the Pyro, occupied with firing its flare gun at an enemy soldier, was backstabbed by the enemy spy. It let out a strangled, muffled yelp, and dropped to the ground.

Spy wasted no time in backstabbing the enemy himself before their intelligence could be grabbed. As soon as the enemy fell, Spy bolted back to spawn. He was certain he would find Pyro pouting or throwing a tantrum, and he was already planning a snarky remark to throw at it for finally catching it.

The scene at spawn, however, made the words die on his tongue.

Pyro was kneeling on the floor, hands clutched near its own throat. Its body was shaking, its chest was heaving, and its filtered breathing was rapid.

Was it... panicking?

Before he could be noticed, Spy cloaked himself, but he only continued to stare, dumbfounded. He could not recall an instance of Pyro acting this distressed, ever. Even when they had been attacked by the blood-sucking robots before, Pyro had not panicked. Why now?

The match was still progressing, but Spy found himself rooted in place. What was he even supposed to do?

Fortunately he didn't have to wonder for long. In a flash of light, Soldier burst into existence next to Pyro, stumbling as he recovered from the respawn.

The Pyro immediately drew in a sharp breath, shakily rising to its feet as Soldier got his bearings.

"Blasted sniper shot me right out of the air," Soldier grumbled, turning to glance at Pyro. He gave a double-take when he saw it still breathing heavily and trembling slightly. "Now's not the time to be quaking in your boots, Smoky Joe! Move out!" With that, he charged out of spawn.

Shaking its head, Pyro followed Soldier. It ran past Spy's hiding spot, but paused just at the doorway, leaning a hand against it as it fought to catch its breath again. Its breathing had calmed, but it was still shaking.

For the briefest of moments, Spy considered saying something, but held himself back, and Pyro moved on.

Well... this would certainly be something to keep in mind. As it was, however, Spy crept back out into the fray, looking to place some sappers on the enemy sentries. It was time to focus on the match, and he wasn't keen to see... whatever he'd just seen again anytime soon.

—-

Rather than retreating to his smoking room, Spy immediately headed for the Medic's lab, activating his cloak as he did so. Medic had not yet arrived, as he was preoccupied with celebrating with some of their fellow mercs. Spy didn't know quite how long he'd be away, so he would try to keep it quick.

His cloak wore off as he reached the doors to the lab, but that was fine. He'd be alone in here, so—

He opened the doors to a flutter of pigeon wings and immediately winced. Ah, yes, the pigeons. Well, he'd have to watch that they didn't leave droppings on his suit, but he should be fine otherwise.

Turning to the desk, he nearly jumped out of his skin at the sight of gleaming fangs in a set of red jaws open wide. But then Aristotle closed his mouth again with a contented sigh, and snuggled deeper into the spare coat that Medic had left draped over the desk.

Wonderful.

Well, at least he was still asleep. Spy checked his watch, but it hadn't recharged just yet. He'd have to be careful around that stupid baboon.

Creeping over to a nearby filing cabinet, Spy checked it over before selecting the middle drawer. It opened with a soft rattle, and a quick glance at the birds and the ape assured him that he hadn't attracted their attention. From there he flipped through the folders and smiled as he came across one marked with a flame symbol.

Perfect.

Spy slid the folder out of the drawer and began to skim the papers within. They were all medical documents, of course. Several were injury reports detailing gun and knife wounds and their treatment, almost always involving a simple application of the medi gun. These interested him less, though he did briefly skim the report the Medic had written after they'd returned from Gray Mann's base. It was a report detailing the process of the emergency blood transfusion that Pyro (as well as multiple others) had gone through. It wasn't a procedure Spy cared to dwell on, having gone through it himself, but he did take note of a scribble toward the bottom of the sheet that mentioned Medic had had to clean the soot off of the tools he'd used after he'd operated on Pyro.

His mind yanked him back to the smell of blood mixed with soot from last night (and a more distant smell of blood and smoke), and he quickly moved on to the next few papers.

Still very little yielded information that was relevant. Spy already knew that the Pyro could be injured and could bleed just like the rest of them, though there were frustratingly few notes on its physiology other than the soot, and nothing about its mental state. If there was any injury that had left Pyro shaken, Medic had not noted it.

Something else was missing as well. While the file listed many injury reports, there was no medical profile, which might have yielded more answers. Why would it not be in Pyro's file? Surely it would be kept here, unless it were—

Spy paused, and looked at the desk again. There, on the right side, just barely poking out beneath the coat the monkey was sleeping on, was a stack of papers.

Grimacing, Spy put the file away and gently shut the drawer, keeping quiet so as to not wake Aristotle or aggravate the pigeons. The baboon merely sighed, his tail twitching in his sleep.

Spy crept up to the desk, watching the baboon all the while. When it did not stir, he grabbed the edges of the papers, slowly easing them out from under the coat. After a small eternity, they came loose, and Spy was finally able to search through them.

It didn't take long to find the Pyro's class symbol, and he began looking over the papers. One was an injury report. Spy skimmed it, realized it was detailing a knife wound in the arm, and quickly set the paper aside. The next sheet, meanwhile, profiled the Pyro.

...Or attempted to.

Name, age, gender, and country of origin were all listed as "unknown." Spy had expected as much. The height and weight were listed, with a caveat that the weight included the clothing. A blood type was listed as well. The notes that followed, however, were far more interesting:

Species: Unknown.

Patient would not submit to a standard physical.

Higher body temperature than standard, often exceeding 100 F. Patient shows no signs of illness, so this is taken to be normal.

Patient's body is perpetually covered in soot. Body emits a faint glow beneath.

Internal anatomy roughly comparable to humans. Megababoon heart replacement was successful. Patient was awake for surgery and behaved in a threatening manner when further examination was attempted. (Someday...)

Fascinating, but not exactly information that would help him. He was nearly tempted to crumple the paper in frustration when he noticed a small "1 of 2" at the bottom. So there was more information, but another quick search of the papers he'd pulled out did not yield an answer. He looked back at the lab coat, and noticed one last paper sticking out from beneath it. Eyebrows raising, he began to lift up the coat again, only to pause.

...Wait.

He stared at the white coat and the brown hairs dotting it, and slowly turned his gaze to the left.

Aristotle stared at him, then gave a quiet ook.

"AGH!" Spy cried out in spite of himself, jumping back, and immediately the baboon began to shriek. The pigeons startled from their roosts, flying every which way, and Spy scrambled to avoid them.

Aristotle was leaping around the lab erratically, shrieking and howling and beating his tiny fists against every surface he encountered. Papers scattered everywhere, and a few vials were knocked to the ground and shattered.

"Merde!" Spy hissed through clenched teeth. Grasping his watch, he activated his cloak, and cast one last look at the chaos behind him as he bolted out the door—

—straight into the Medic, who subsequently crashed backward into Heavy. Spy's cloak flickered at the collison, but it was enough.

"Ah, Spy," Medic said, an unhappy smile crossing his face. "I didn't hear you come in, but I certainly heard you leave."

As Spy turned off his cloak, Aristotle scrambled out of the lab and leaped up into Medic's arms, chittering and pointing at Spy.

"Yes, thank you, Aristotle, I noticed."

"What is Spy doing in Medic's lab?" Heavy asked, brow furrowed.

"Nothing, now," Spy muttered, and brushed past them, only for Heavy to grab his arm. "What—"

"I don't appreciate people snooping around my lab," Medic said, staring directly at Spy and petting Aristotle. "What were you trying to get into?"

"I was merely performing an investigation. It has nothing to do with you!" Spy struggled to pull his arm away, but the Heavy held tight.

"I see! Nothing involving me... in my lab."

"Spy is acting strange," Heavy said, his grip tightening ever so slightly. "Maybe is not our spy."

Spy went still for fear the Heavy would break his arm. "I'm not, I—" He faltered. "I used my disguise kit to turn into Bela Lugosi when we watched that terrible movie a couple Halloweens ago."

Heavy immediately let go, while Medic gave him a look of bewilderment that was shared by Aristotle. "You what—"

"Spy is our spy," Heavy said simply, and crossed his arms. "Still acting funny, though."

"Yes," Medic agreed. "What are you up to?"

Brushing off his sleeve, Spy heaved a sigh. "I was just looking into some files."

Medic eyed him for a long moment, while Aristotle fixed him with a judgmental stare. Then the Medic's eyebrows raised in recognition. "Ah, you were peeking into Pyro's files, weren't you?"

Spy looked away, idly lighting a cigarette. "That is classified information."

"Indeed!" Another unhappy smile crossed the Medic’s face. "Those documents are classified."

He bit into the filter. "You're one to talk about ethics, Monsieur Working-for-the-Other-Team."

"We were fired," Heavy cut in. "It was only team at the time."

Spy opened his mouth, faltered, and let out a stream of smoke through his nose. "Fine. Yes, I was searching the Pyro's file for information."

"Information that you were about to ask me for this morning." Medic looked him in the eyes.

Sighing, Spy turned away, his feet itching to retreat back to his smoking room, or his bedroom, or literally anywhere else. "Oui. I just decided to take matters into my own hands."

"Why?"

He paused. Slowly he turned to face Medic and Heavy again. "What?"

"Why take matters into your own hands?"

Heavy nodded. "Spy's hands are tiny. Cannot hold much."

"You are not a doctor," Medic went on. "Why not ask one, if you are seeking medical information?"

"Because..." Because why would you want to help? "Because it is my mission."

Shrugging, Medic allowed Aristotle to hop down from his arms. "Well, I'm not part of this mission, so I suppose I will not pry." He then crouched down to address the monkey. "Come now, Aristotle. Help me clean this mess."

With a snort, Spy turned to leave, only to jump back when Heavy's arm blocked his path. Spy glared up into the Heavy's face. "What?"

"Spy's hands are tiny," he repeated.

Spy's teeth ground against his cigarette. "Yes, compared to your monstrous mitts."

Pulling his arm away, Heavy held out his palm. "Heavy's hands are much bigger. Can hold more, help carry."

Freezing, Spy looked between Heavy's hand and face a few times. Finally he gave a derisive snort. "What would I need help carrying?" he grumbled, and stormed off.

[winchestersheaven]

Smowkie recs McShep

i've been reading a lot of McShep fics lately and a while back i mentioned that i had plans to make a couple of fic rec posts. they're taking me forever to make, but here's the first one, finally!

@wonkyelk was one of the first authors i found, and i've read and loved SO MANY of their fics! wonderful author that made me fall head over heels for the pining!John and oblivious!Rodney trope! 💖

this is by no means an exhaustive list of the fics i loved from them, it's just a small number of the ones i read and enjoyed. my biggest recommendation with this author is to just go read their fics, it's great stuff and their language is delightful.

so here goes, in no particular order:

19 McShep fics by WonkyElk (under the cut, because this got long)

Of Sealing Wax and String 3562 words | Teen author's tags: First Kiss, Fluff and Angst, POV Rodney McKay summary:

Rodney had never had so much love in his life that he wasn't desperate to catch all the drops that he could.

Smowkie: there are too many things that i love in this to mention them all, so i'll just add my favorite quote from the fic: "[...] a thoughtful look, albeit one squarely aimed at the floor, which was hardly likely to appreciate it." 💖

You’re the Book That I Have Opened 1834 words | Teen author's tags: Pining John Sheppard, Oblivious Rodney McKay, Character Study, Angst with a Happy Ending, Short, Internalized Homophobia summary:

At eighteen, John Sheppard had known a lot of things. He knew how to dance, with exactly the right level of polite formality. He knew how to ride well and the proper care of a horse. He knew everything about the theory and mathematics of flight. He knew that being a fighter pilot was the absolute dream of his life. And he knew - knew - that he wasn't into guys.

Smowkie: lovely thing, chock-full of John feels, and with this quote: "They sat in silence for a while. Silence was something John could do. It never came out awkward or wrong, you could never blurt out unintentional silence, or get your bits of silence all mixed up and taken out of context." brb, crying about John Sheppard.

How to Disappear Completely 7276 words | Teen author's tags: Angst with a Happy Ending, Temporary Character Death, Feelings Realization, POV Alternating summary:

"Look, I know you don’t know me and you’re not aware of the fact that, if you knew I was missing - which you don’t, because I never existed and, even if I did, you wouldn’t have met me yet - then you’d be very, very upset about it … but I really need your help. And, actually, so does the universe."

Smowkie: this one is amazing! mild horror warning for the creepiness in the beginning, that was some well written discomfort! also, so much love the fantastic way WonkyElk chose to show Rodney's mood and vulnerability 💖

New Every Day 2047 words | Gen author's tags: Pining John Sheppard, Oblivious Rodney McKay, Angst, Short, POV John Sheppard, Character Study summary:

Sometimes it seemed like he had to relearn emotions, over and over again.

Smowkie: this one! what a lovely thing. all the John feels. i want to add a couple of quotes here too, but they're right at the end so i'm not doing that, sadly. i can quote "Especially Rodney" though, because especially Rodney 💖

Some Misunderstanding 6193 words | Teen author's tags: Hurt/Comfort, Angst, Human Experimentation, First Kiss, POV Alternating summary:

The path to Ascension was not a smooth one.

Smowkie: this one! UNCOMFY. really really good with a very interesting style, but oof, uncomfy! love it!

All You Need is … 1830 words | Teen author's tags: Short, Feelings Realization, First Kiss, Fluff and Angst summary:

The thing about love was, that it wasn't enough. It might fill you up and set you alight and hug you close and tear your heart out and pet you gently and hang like a slow-dragging weight around your neck: but, for all of its bullying and grandstanding, it skipped right over all the practical things and let you scramble around to fix those up - or not - as best you might; but definitely with none of its assistance.

Smowkie: this made me all mushy inside, it was great 💖

Flowers and Other Ambiguities 1289 words | Gen author's tags: Pre-Slash, Character Study, POV John Sheppard, Short, Pining John Sheppard, Oblivious Rodney McKay summary:

The field was blossoming in such rich dark blues and purples, with an underlying green, that John was irresistibly put in mind of the ocean, his feet lightly stepping over the water, mindful of the lurking creatures of the deep.

Smowkie: this one holds a special place in my heart. it was one of the first McShep fics i read and it's what really sold me on the pining!John and oblivious!Rodney trope. it's such a wonderful fic, and the pining, man the pining 💖

But Soft … 1645 words | Teen author's tags: Fluff, Alternate Universe - College/University, Theatre, Short summary:

"I'm just suggesting, John, that, perhaps your speeches about Juliet, should not be notably less impassioned than your banter with Mercutio."

Smowkie: i’m generally not interested in AUs for McShep, but i had enjoyed so much from WonkyElk that i read this anyway, and BOY am i glad i did, because i adored this!

Not Early, But Not Too Late 810 words | Teen author's tags: Short, Realisations, Getting Together, First Kiss summary: 

Rodney finally learns the language.

Smowkie: this is just lovely 💖

A Matter of Mugs 2959 words | Teen author's tags: Post-Canon, Break Up, Light Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Getting Together, Oblivious Rodney McKay summary:

Rodney's emotional levels were generally at critical, but, right now, they were straining the banks and spoiling for a flood of world-drowning proportions. This wasn't because of a crisis, nor even anything so petty and ordinary as a mid-life crisis - not that Rodney was old enough for that, slap bang in the very prime of life as he was and intended to remain - but more of a build up of small things and not-so small things, stacking up awkwardly on top of each other and wobbling under the pressure and the terrible engineering choices.

Smowkie: this is a wonderful read, and i love how John comes first for Rodney long before he realizes his feelings for him. also Rodney and Jeannie bonding 💖 (to clarify the break-up tag: i've chosen not to add relationship tags in this post since all fics are McShep, but this fic has both the John/Rodney and the Jennifer/Rodney relationship tags, and the break-up tag is for Jennifer/Rodney)

One Stroke of The Moon 1378 words | Gen author's tags: Short, Episode: s05e06 The Shrine, Light Angst, Team as Family summary:

When the Avarro moon hangs lowest in the sky, ripe and full - so bright and summoning that your head becomes full of it and nothing else exists - then it is, that some climb to the very top of the trees, stretch out their hands and their hopes and touch her on the belly, with a reverent stroke. Those that touch the moon in this way are never the same afterwards. Nor would they want to be.

Smowkie: this is such a lovely thing. the team’s loyalty and love to Rodney is just 💖

A Staff, A Spear 2179 words | Teen author's tags: Character Study, Angst, Pining John Sheppard, Oblivious Rodney McKay, Short, POV John Sheppard summary:

For a time, he had no memory, no self; no pain. Until the sunshine cooled in his blood and the wine left him with a sigh, like a ghost, and his whole personality fell back inside him, with a thump. It was so heavy, being himself again, he could almost have cried.

Smowkie: the fic that made me make this post. this one really hits you smack in the face with John feels. it's heartbreaking and painful in the best of ways. 💖

Setting Parameters 4545 words | Teen author's tags: Hurt/Comfort, Action/Adventure, Virtual Reality, POV Alternating summary:

It absolutely wasn’t a holodeck.

Smowkie: i love a good holodeck disaster story, but this is so much more than just that, and i adore it. the McShep relationship especially, but also Teyla (and Ford too) 💖 much love! and my favorite quote: They rested against each other when they were done, in a way which, to the laymen’s mind, might very easily be confused with snuggling. guys, come on... xD 💖

A Pair of Shadows 2090 words | Teen author's tags: POV Outsider, Rodney and John are Stuck Together, Fluff summary: 

John and Rodney become joined at the hip. This is not metaphorical.

Smowkie: glorious outsider POV fic 💖

Opposite to Blue 1459 words | Teen author's tags: Short, Character Study, References to Depression, Angst with a Happy Ending, POV John Sheppard summary:

The first time that John had met Rodney McKay he had been brightly, regrettably, orange.

Smowkie: more John feels 💖 Rodney is such a sweetheart in this, and he pretty much killed me with the quote "the wiggly thing your voice did when you called me" 💖

A Sufficiency of Freedom 1342 words | Teen author's tags: Character Study, Short, Light Angst, Pining John Sheppard, Oblivious Rodney McKay, POV John Sheppard summary:

From time to time, people had asked John why he loved to fly.

Smowkie: this has such great imagery, a beautiful insight in John's mind 💖

An Anchor in the Mist 1620 words | Teen author's tags: Short, Hurt/Comfort, Injury Recovery, First Kiss, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, POV John Sheppard summary:

Sometimes, when he was back on Earth, John would look around at the colours, the brightness, the busyness - the sheer number of people, the surrealism of it all - and wonder if it was actually real.

Smowkie: THIS ONE! i adore this one. it's John feels again, and it's hurt/comforty and angsty and sweet and loving and painful and happy and just beautiful. i want to live in this one 💖

To silent ash 1529 words | Teen author's tags: Angst and Feels, Post-Canon, Sad summary:

Dear Jeannie…

Smowkie: ah, pain. it's beautiful and so very sad. read the author's note before the fic and decide if you want the spoilers or not, but either way it's worth it imo, i loved it

Accepting a Complement 1433 words | Gen author's tags: Short, Feelings, working out a relationship summary:

He wasn't sure exactly when he and Sheppard had become 'those two' or 'you two' or 'that pair' to so many people. But, now that the phrase had jumped up and bit him, so to speak, he was very aware that he had heard it too many times to count.

Smowkie: this fic made me feel in love with McShep. i mean, i guess i am in love with McShep, that's sorta how i ship, i see something and fall in love. but this fic, yeah, it brought it out so much that i was just a mess reading it, the whole thing; giddy, grinning, the stomach thing that feels a lot like anxiety but isn't. yeah, i love this one, it made me so happy 💖

[demialwrites]

Spontaneous Disrespect

I originally wasn't going to put this here but fuck it. I used to write worse. It's just harder to find now because the search function is broken on this website

Rufus profaning his father's memorial. Filth that may come a smidge too close to incest for some under the cut. Mild omorashi and watersports.

One might think Rufus planned this. Because Rufus Shinra is always scheming. Not so. Not today. He decided on a whim to drink an extra cup of coffee before visiting his father's grave. The gravestone was almost grand enough to be called a monument. It was in the signature style of the Shinra building. Mostly black and it screamed oppression and technological advancement. Not the colours Rufus preferred but this was for appearances, only.

Normally, he was content to just talk shit at his father's silent gravestone. He never fails to smugly grin when his father's corpse has no rebuttal. He could stand over the gravestone all day, puffing himself up and listing all the ways he's a better president.

Whether or not it's true.

No, today he had extra coffee on a whim. So halfway through his usual song and dance, he gets the urge to pee.

Rufus goes silent, considering the shiny gravestone below him. One might even think he was being respectful for once. He did hire someone to clean this area regularly to give the illusion of respect.

But no, there's no respect today. The opposite of it.

He takes a step back, to avoid any errant splashes. It takes too long to undo his trousers and the wait makes the pressure grow worse. Once the front of his trousers is open, he is as quick on the draw and to aim as with his beloved shotgun. He leaned forward slightly, putting effort into it. Rufus was tall enough that the piss hit the stone with loud, rapid slapping sounds. He chuckled under his breath. He allowed himself a long, satisfied sigh.

When his bladder would squeeze out no more, he took his hand away from his dick. Confusingly, it was partially hard. If he shifted his weight, it swung awkwardly. He glared down at it, as if it had its own mind and chose to embarrass him at this very moment.

He glanced at the gravestone, then back at his erection. He already soiled it one way. And it's true, Rufus was a person who went all in when he did something.

He removed one of his gloves. Instead of putting it in a pocket, he pressed it between his lips, letting it dangle. Rufus narrowed his eyes at his father's name in particular. He stroked the top of his length to get it nice and hard then his hand settled at the base.

If only his father could see his son's triumph. I bet he didn't see it coming. His hand moved faster at the thought. Holding the glove in his mouth had the convenient effect of muffling his first, soft moan.

Rufus was alive and his father was not. Who was incompetent, now? Can't be competent if you're dead. Clear precum was dribbling out and down the underside. Rufus stroked higher, only to twist his hand back down. His cock glowed with a slimy sheen in the dim light.

He growled quietly through teeth biting into the glove. He repeated the motions a few times, slicking his hand with fresh precum, then adding another layer to the rest of his length. He panted and the glove waved with each breath. From his view, his cock jutted out over the ‘monument’ and he could already picture it covered in white below. It was his favourite colour, anyway. His glove dropped to the ground as he moaned. How fitting.

Rufus tried to hold off as long as he could; daddy deserved as much as his son could give. He growled at the thought, a mix of disgust and pleasurable pressure building in his lower belly. The tipping point was just beyond, resulting in lazy, white splotches spreading and obscuring enough words on the gravestone to make it unreadable.

Rufus sneered. ��Finally did something well enough for you, Dad?”

For every second that passed after that, the pleasure dissipated, leaving the disgust behind. He snatched the glove off the ground like it jumped there just to piss him off. He shoved his dick back into his layers of pants and stomped off.

Yet, he’d probably do it again.

[earthstellar]

Image Comics has dropped their solicits for December 2023, and it looks like Duke #1 is where the Transformers/GI Joe crossover is gonna start really kicking off for the Energon Universe.

I know the general reception to the crossover at the end of ROTB was pretty rough, so it's interesting that they're getting the ball rolling in a GI Joe mini-series.

Personally, my dad was drafted into two wars against his will and suffered greatly for it, so I never had any interest in GI Joe because my dad vehemently hated that shit, as he felt it glorified war to children and that this is morally unacceptable. (He preferred the depiction of Army life of that era in MASH, which he said was at least more honest and aimed at adults.)

I also had classmates who ended up joining the military who had been big fans of GI Joe, two of whom were killed in Afghanistan. I know GI Joe wasn't the only factor involved in their decisions, but it certainly does not make me inclined to like the franchise.

My mother lost her first husband in Vietnam. He had also been drafted against his will. (I strongly dislike the GI Joe Vietnam era material in particular, for perhaps obvious reasons.)

So, I admit my general dislike of the concept of GI Joe as a franchise is at least partly based in my own trauma (and that of my family) relating to the US Army.

I've never been a GI Joe person and never will be (on moral and trauma based grounds), so I fully admit I am not well versed on the lore of that universe, and as such, it's hard for me to make any guesses at what Duke #1 might bring.

But what interests me is that on certain forums and other social media, I've seen very limited audience hype about this crossover in general, especially from the Transformers crowd.

After the extremely progressive writing and fresh visual style and designs of the IDW Transformers storylines which appealed to a lot of people across several age ranges and generations of fans, it feels weird (to me at least) to suddenly have a more old school style crossover with what is essentially a US military propaganda franchise-- At a time when the sociopolitical zeitgeist is that "going traditional" is often associated with "going backwards".

All art is political, and so on.

But I do wonder if what seems to be a lack of audience hype is partially due to the fact that not a lot of Transformers fans (at least, not many under the age of 40 based on what I'm seeing around the internet at the moment) seem to be all that into GI Joe.

A lot of young people are not exactly in love with US military fantasies, and the last Transformers comic series with IDW was a big hit with younger/teen readers-- A lot of that audience might be lost, here.

(And vice-versa from what I can tell, although I'm not in any GI Joe fan spaces so I'm not sure what the mood might be in that community in regards to the Transformers element of this crossover.)

All that having been said, the Energon Universe is only just getting started, and who knows what the comics will actually contain!

I do like G1, so I like the designs for the Transformers as drawn in this run this far.

And who knows, maybe they'll do something new with GI Joe for this. I'm aware that in at least one of the cartoons, they were essentially on the run from the military instead of working for it, which is an interesting twist. Perhaps something similar might happen here, with some Joes siding with the Autobots instead?

It's not fair to judge before a comic is even released, so I'm just thinking out loud here in regards to the crossover concept in general.

I'd be interested to hear what anyone else thinks:

Will you be checking out Duke #1 as a Transformers fan interested in the crossover?

Have any of you been interested in GI Joe previously?

If you're an IDW Transformers fan, are you interested in the Energon Universe?

Any other thoughts on the crossover, any conjecture or hopes for the direction of this run?

I want to give the Energon Universe a chance, but as I mentioned, I do have some difficulty attempting to get into GI Joe in general.

That having been said, I guess we'll have to wait and see what they do with this crossover.

[gaysheep]

Touching is Good: A Retrospective

My trusty Nintendo 3DS, which has held out since I was gifted it for my 15th birthday, has turned one decade old with my 25th birthday this past November. Given new life with custom firmware and nds-bootstrap via TWiLightMenu, the 3DS is stellar for visiting any past handheld title or console title up to (and somewhat including) the N64. (Quick plug for the CFW/hacking community for the less popular PS Vita, too, which has accomplished some pretty crazy-cool stuff this last year.) I use my 3DS more often than I use my Nintendo Switch most weeks.

The Nintendo DS (minus the three) launched in late 2004. The second display and stylus support were novel tools for developers to experiment with, and the NDS is best remembered for its robust catalogue of RPGs and visual novels. Where it lacked in power, narrative-focused games flourished under its technical limitations.

That being said, while browsing the ROM archives on Vimm's Lair to pick up some titles, I was reminded of what an interesting era the mid-to-late 2000s were for games. While Sony and Microsoft were fighting over the "core gamer" demographic, who had outgrown Nintendo mascots, Nintendo led a series of wildly successful marketing campaigns for its hardware after the light failure of the Gamecube, where the Nintendo DS and then the Wii were targeted at...everyone else.

[Image source. Image description in alt text.]

If you look at ads for the DS and the Wii, you'll see that adults are featured much more prominently than children, especially women and seniors. (This did not go unnoticed, as I found this ancient relic of misogyny while looking for images for this post.) A Nintendo handheld was already an easy sell to parents with small children (though I think it's also notable that ads which do focus on children often prominently feature girls. Munchlax is pretty hot...), but Nintendo's angle for the DS and Wii was that their hardware wasn't just for children. The Wii was a way to get up off the couch and to play board games with grandma. The DS was a great gadget for a working woman to keep in her pocketbook.

This worked. The Wii and DS were two of the best-selling consoles of all time. In particular, the DS's marketing campaign only worked because it came out in the perfect window of time. PDA-phone hybrids had been around since the 90s, and the Blackberry had been kicking around for a few years, but the iPhone wouldn't be introduced until 2007, and the 4G LTE standard wouldn't be released until 2009. While the Blackberry was popular with businesspeople and the PDA was out of style, smartphones were luxury toys for several years; they wouldn't become near-ubiquious until the mid-2010s. I didn't get my own smartphone until probably around the same time I got my 3DS, a full handheld generation later.

Browsing the software library for the Nintendo DS and DSi with that in mind is really interesting. Many titles released for the platform serve the same purposes that would be fulfilled by simple smartphone apps less than a decade later: planners and diaries, fitness trackers, calculators, language learning and SAT prep software, even a guide to the then-most-recent version of the driver's test in the UK. These proliferated with the release of the DSi's virtual store, but they existed even with the base model. You could go to a brick-and-mortar store and buy them on physical cartridges. (You might be wondering, "Why would you bother carrying those around over just buying a Blackberry?" You can't underestimate how expensive the service bills for a smartphone were before companies realized they were the most powerful spyware tool in history.)

There was never a time where every single businesswoman in New York carried a DS Lite, but adults did buy and use them, and a not insignificant portion of the DS's software library is aimed at a casual adult audience. Another niche covered mostly by smartphone games these days—games designed to be picked up and played in short sessions on-the-go, in places like waiting rooms and subway commutes.

Nintendo made crazy bank in the seventh console generation. Publications of the time talked about a console war between Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo, but the real battle was between the PS3 and the Xbox 360 over the gamer demographic. Nintendo was producing hardware for a niche who would quietly disappear once smartphone sales began ballooning by hundreds of millions per year over the course of the early 2010s.

After the failure of the Wii U, Nintendo's marketing strategy pivoted again, though I doubt they'll ever completely abandon their family-friendly image. Currently beat out only by the PS2 and the DS, the Nintendo Switch may very well climb to a status as the best-selling console of all time before the end of its lifespan, but the "gamer" demographic is much bigger than it was two decades ago at the dawn of the DS. As more and more devices become consolidated into the Swiss army knife the smartphone has become, consoles can only carve out a role as dedicated gaming machines.

I'm not sure we'll ever see anything like the Nintendo DS or the Wii again. I think they're worth looking back on for their uniqueness in that way as much as they are for the more celebrated parts of their libraries.

[7grandmel]

Todays rip: 09/02/2024

Magolor's Shoppe Fusion Collab

Season 8 Featured on: The Joke​-​Explainer 7000​™��'s Highest Quality Rips: Sunrise

Ripped by Bruh de la Boi, ChickenSuitGuy, circunflexo, Cosmic199X, Edgi, Ellie53, Jiko Music, Memmy, Pan Visuals by BobTheTacocat

Tentative rip name: Joke-Explainer 7000 Fusion Collab

Look alive, everyone - Season 8 of SiIvaGunner has now officially premiered!

It may be a bit rich to say as someone running this blog, and with such deep investment into the channel, but...Season 7 really did bring me back into SiIvaGunner in a way I never quite thought would be possible. I'd sort of just accepted with Season 4, Season 5 and Season 6 that the channel had found a new direction: one that I was still VERY much a fan of, yet not quite the one that had "sold" me on the channel the same way Season 1, Season 2 and Season 3 did. I felt as if I was missing that energy of just...sheer visceral excitement for the future of the channel as a whole from the later-year seasons. There was instead a lot of per-event excitement, tons of little events to enjoy and still fun to be had in speculation of what could happen next, yet that aforementioned optimism still felt like it...missing, for a long time. And funny enough - last I discussed that feeling in particular was with Patched Plains Fusion Collab, a rip that Magolor's Shoppe Fusion Collab very much seems to be intentionally aiming to evoke.

Part of the reason that Patched Plains Fusion Collab works so well for me, and indeed why Season 2 has long sat as my favorite in the channel's life, is that feeling of raw forward momentum it conveys - the excitement of the entire fanbase thankful that SiIvaGunner hadn't actually ended, distilled into an anthem of so many different styles cheerfully pushing us forward. It was that sort of progress that, back when they were airing, I felt was sort of absent from Seasons 4/5/6 - the SiIvaGunner AI was still running things, Wood Man was still off effectively doing sidequests, and though the rips had obviously gotten better the cynical side of me couldn't help but feel a bit sad at how - for a lack of a better word - "predictable" it all felt. And to be crystal clear: A lot of those feelings have obviously changed for the better over the years. I love all of SiIvaGunner's Seasons nowadays, and I realized eventually that the prior-mentioned cynicism toward the new direction wasn't as fun as just, appreciating and LOVING the stuff to come out from the new seasons for the excellence that they were. And funny enough, I feel like that exact mindset is exactly what made Season 7 work so well for me.

Wheras Season 2 is one I remember for its feeling of constantly moving things forward at a rocket-speed pace, Season 7 excels by doing the complete opposite - the Year of Grand Dad is, at almost every possible turn, defined by its sense of self-celebration, a sort of "Sonic Generations"-type of tribute to the entire channel's life. Be it with RIP² as covered in SING A SONG ABOUT HOPES AND DREAMS, the entire incredible April Fools event I've alluded to within Violet Snow Memories, a newfound sense of chaos clearly inspired by Season 1 as shown in Hidden Headtoilets (skibidi toree 2) - yet with Seasons 4/5/6s newfound touch for genuine quality arrangements as found in rips like Forest of Tears. And, atop it all, the long-awaited continuation of the storyline last progressed back in Season 2 with the Christmas Comeback Crisis' eleventh episode. With such an incredible smörgåsbord of content on offer, it feels damn near impossible for me not to consider Season 7 my all-time new favorite.

And that optimism for the Season, that optimism for the future, is why Magolor's Shoppe Fusion Collab struck such a chord with me, with its release just a few days ago. With Season 7's ending, the status quo of the channel has been fundamentally altered in a way it hasn't truly been in a long while. For the first time ever, the long-present side character "Joke-Explainer™ 7000" is in full charge of the channel - her most prominent role ever despite having been around since all the way back in Season 1. I'll likely be dedicating another Season 8 post in the future to talking about her in particular with the same level of detail I did back in Vote Responsibly!!, but the context I'll provide for now is that her theme song, Magolor's Shoppe, has been a familiar, comforting tune to many a SiIvaGunner viewer since way back in Season 2. To see Patched Plains Fusion Collab not only get a spiritual successor, but one building upon a character and theme we've long grown attached to, means something so much to me and so many others. The added visuals, of her doing her duty with adorable Kirby-themed artwork as textboxes, are truly the cherry on top of an amazing collab.

From referencing the very beginnings of the channel with an initial arrangement using Pokémon Ruby, to using familiar-yet-infrequent sources such as Thwomp Volcano and Snail's House (jokes "worth explaining", so to speak!), to perhaps even hinting at what jokes are to become even more frequent in Season 8, such as the GOAT of all new jokes I Show Meat - I was long anticipating what the official premiere of Season 8 would be, and Magolor's Shoppe Fusion Collab was everything I never knew I wanted. My excitement for Season 8 is perhaps higher than for any other Season in the channel's long history, and I can't wait to get to share that excitement with all of you.

[stonieelonesome]

They don't realize the gravity of what they have done.

They have ended their website from the root up, and their downfall did not begin in 2024.

Taking away the communication style of Quotev not only drastically changed the dynamic of the website, but how users have the ability to advertise their books if they publish them. How roleplayers find others to roleplay with.

I know 2 people off of the top of my head right now that met on Quotev, fell in love, and got married irl.

Quotev wasn't just a website for A LOT of people - it was a social media for writers and artists that wasn't as advanced and code-y as Tumblr, wasn't as basic as Discord, and wasn't as ugly (sorry) as Wattpad and Ao3. Quotev was unique in many ways and that's why I kept coming back after 12 years of being on that cursed fucking website.

Yes, ultimately their downfall was changing the entirety of Quotev. However, I truly think that the beginning of the end of Quotev was when they began deleting roleplay accounts and further updating/nitpicking with their guidelines 2015-2020 -- as well as the gigantic Halloween update of 2016 where they took away colors, and groups. Even then, the entirety of Quotev banned together and bullied them into giving us back groups - - which they promptly took away again by the next update. They have gave us and taken away groups back 4 times that I can think of off the top of my head.

Furthermore, as another user said, how are we supposed to trust Quotev after....this one?

Because you see, this one was different. After all of their stupid, ridiculous, and ultimately NITPICKY ass updates, this one is the one where everyone, as a community and collective, regardless if you were simply a feed spammer or die-hard roleplayer/write, regardless of fandom and viewpoints, collectively decided "this is too far" and got off the website.

I was writing my first book that I had plans of publishing on Quotev. I was in the beginning stages of formatting a novel on Quotev. All of it is off of that website now, because if they can delete something as crucial as the main communication system without any prior warning, they can and will do that to your journals and published works.

Quotev killed the very one thing it aimed to create and that was trust and community. Like I said in a previous post, even if Quotev does recover from this, the trust is far too broken for I think a lot of us.

At least it is for me.

I gave 12 years to this website and I never expected them to quite literally bomb themselves because they wanted to be particular about everything that was happening on their website. Which further makes me push, if you wanted to be so deeply involved in the production of media and source on your website, why be as anonymous as you are? Because now, it's all over.

Rest in Peace, Quotev

[minevn]

Here we go again talking about "Mine" and explaining my absence. For the past month or two I've been questioning myself if I want to put Mine on a hiatus(Which I didn't feel was surprising considering that I've vented about the game so much on this blog, I'm sorry for that). I wouldn't be getting rid of it and I would be heading back to it eventually, but I just needed to step away and really think about what I wanted to do. At this point in time I'm still questioning what I want to do. Long story short Mine won't be getting released any time soon and it needs a lot of work to be done on it, in every way.

I think my biggest issue was rushing into this project. I was so SO excited to just get my story out and talk about my characters and ideas, but I had almost nothing set in stone or planned out. Some of my favorite story aspects I created after I made this blog, granted it wasn't a obvious change since it had to do with spoilers, and story aspect kind of just fit together to make a bigger plot twist. I still love what I've created thus far, but it needs so much work, and it feels weird and off to have changes just happen with the characters and story.

I was getting bored of certain characters and the art style. I won't be getting rid of any characters because even the ones who don't seem that important to the overall plot are still important, but I'll be changing/upgrading character designs. And especially changing the art style. I was really disliking my style for Mine and even more so after the Halloween drawing. I did practice around a bit and I found a style I like, but it's still not set in stone.

This is kind of what I was thinking. The eyes have a more defined shape, the nose is different, the hair is more detailed. I've also been wanted to mess around with coloring and shading. And once again this style is not set in stone, but this is what I'm leaning towards as of now. I want the game to have an anime style for reasons, but I did also try a style that's more mine I guess? Like I drew Yani in the style I draw in the most, the style that's most consistent to me. I mainly did this because one my bestfriends has been helping me sort out my own feelings and she said to at least try a more cartoon style even if the anime style is what I'm aiming for in the end.

I obviously I do like the style, but it's just not what I'm going for, so I was going to try drawing different eyes styles and then I would build a face to match that.

I did like these, but it didn't inspire me and I didn't want these for Mine. So this is what I've been working on for now, I'm trying t build my interest in this story again. I know I've talked about it before, but Yani and Jun's designs are the ones I'm most proud about(maybe Aki as well, if I change anything it wouldn't be too extreme), but the other characters will be getting an upgrade, in design, story, and personality.

Minato in particular. I feel so bad because as much as I like Minato, he feels so plain to me. Like I don't have fun writing him or drawing him. There are things I do really enjoy about him, like his hair style, and his yellow eyes. But I'm bored with pretty much everything else about him, and that's not a good sign, he's the first route, the first character to be released. he needs something to draw in the player, but I don't feel like he has that. I don't know where to really go with him though. I think the fact that he's the least yandere is charming and important, like to lure the player into a false sense of security, almost as if they were just playing a normal visual novel/dating sim with routes, and then the creepy stuff starts mainly happening with the other routes, but obviously I need something to make his route exciting.

In the meantime asks will most likely not be answered until I've figured the characters out more. When I figure out the characters as well, I want to go back and slowly work on updating previous asks to fit the new personality and stories. I'll probably make a poll on how to go about that just in case people want the old answered asks or something. Maybe I could just do something like-

Old: bhjdhsvjagjhasgd

New: VHJDhfdjgshdf

I don't know as of now. I also want to go back and update my 100 followers event drawings, and obviously finish that. Which by the way I am so sorry to everyone who sent in requests, for that event and just in general. Me struggling with Mine's art style has been a thing, even with the refs, there were some refs that I just hated how they turned out(cough cough Hoshi). I also have been practicing with more cartoon(?) styles, so working on a game with an anime style reminds me of my past styles, which I hated because I got those feeling of hating my style or falling behind my peers who were finding their style. I'm a lot better with it now, but I felt like I was falling back into old habits/styles, and it was upsetting.

While I was planning my hiatus, I kept thinking about some of my other game ideas because if I was going to go on hiatus I would focus on another one of my games with a more simple style(Since I wondered if complexity of the style was also an issue for my lack of motivation with Mine), and I do like my other games and ideas and characters, but none of hem were appealing to me like how Mine did. I went into Mine so excited and ready to talk and share my characters, but with my other stories I was just feeling more unmotivated with them, other then "The Magi Academy" which makes sense since that is my comfort story but also I'm gonna work on this in the background since the game is huge.

Another thing I thought about doing while on hiatus was making a test game, where I get used to making games, where I practice. Cause Mine is my first game, but I'm not sure I want it to actually be my first game, but I have no interest in my other games as of now so this game would be simple, a little test to get used to everything that comes with making a game. I'll probably work on this while I'm working on the art style for Mine and the character designs. It will have multiple routes and characters. I wouldn't really call it a dating sim, there will be romance elements but I think more then anything it will be a little "get to know my oc's" type story. Maybe I'll talk about it more if anyone if interested. Although when I make games in the future I'll either make the blogs later, when the game is almost finished or if finished, or at least claim the name and work on them later.

I'd say that Mine is going on a hiatus, at least with this blog, but I will be working on it! Mine won't be getting released soon and when I made this blog I didn't expect Mine to come out this year. Another thing I want to end up doing is dev logs, maybe weekly or monthly, it won't happen soon, but eventually I want to do dev logs. As of now though, I have a lot to think about with the characters and the story/stories. I'll probably work on character personalities and stories before their actual design so I can get back to writing asks, and then I'll be redoing refs and any bigger drawings I've done so far. I also want to have a schedule for answering asks, so I'll probably spend the weekends answering asks and then the weekdays I'll be working on the game, but this is for the future. My ask box and messages will be open though if anyone has any questions :3 I hope that this will help me regain the passion and excitement that I hold for this story, have a great day/night, and thank you for you continued support🩵

[kareofbears]

a fragile line, chapter 3/3

Newt and Thomas always had something going on—even in the Maze, Gally knew right away. But never did he think it would turn into something like this; a devotion fermented. A reverence that made the chapel look blasphemous in comparison.

—

Or, as they infiltrate WICKED, Gally notices the shift between Newt and Thomas.

read the final chapter below or the entire work on ao3

Gally had never seen Thomas fight, not really. But he's just as ruthless as he'd imagined.

His lungs are on fire, the soles of his feet beginning to burn as they sprint from one end of the WICKED tower to the other, Thomas leading them with a single-minded focus. The only time he slows is to make sure that Newt is still close to him before advancing.

Masks on, boys, Gally told them as they exited the stairwell. They know we're here, but they don't know how to figure out it's us. Let's take this nice and easy and we'll get to the med wing before we know it. That was out the window as soon as Thomas took a step out the door.

The sprinting, Gally doesn't have a problem with. He did have a problem with it, in the beginning, but it was nothing compared to what came after.

The first target was a WICKED soldier who took a step in front of Thomas to stop them. He responded by shooting him in the gut with a stun gun.

Things got out of hand from there.

People started screaming. Some, astutely, turned tail and ran. But soldiers took out their own firearms, cocky and stupid and unaware that Thomas was on a warpath.

Thomas doesn't fight with any particular style or strategy but Gally still recognizes the influence from all over the place—sees Minho in his throws, sees WICKED soldiers in the brutality of his strikes, and surprisingly, sees himself whenever Thomas knocks someone down on their ass. But for the most part, he sees Newt in Thomas' movements, recognizes the false sense of calm and steady movements that coats his every move like the beginnings of a storm.

Thomas tears through their advancing ranks, shattering ranks and letting electric bullets fly from the barrel like it was limitless. Not a moment of hesitation as he mows through soldier after soldier, barely taking a glance before taking a shot. Gally is reminded that he's actually clever when he isn't being a lovestruck idiot. The ways Thomas can conceive of ways to rapidly move people out of the way was terrifying and spectacular; tossing stunners in well-positioned spots, shooting lights out so there's a temporary black out, pushing people over railings and staircases without hesitation.

The soldiers aren't used to fighting someone so fast who fights with such grit and utter lack of consideration—by the time they realize what they're up against, they're already on the ground. The wake of bodies he leaves behind him as they stalk past is a sick gingerbread trail to anyone who dares to follow them. Gally doesn't even bother telling him off. The plan's gone to shit and he can't exactly disagree with Thomas' methods considering how much ground they're covering in a short amount of time. Besides, he doesn't have the urge to see himself caught in the crossfire.

To his credit, none of his hits are lethal. When Thomas eventually runs out of ammo and pulls out a real pistol, he goes for flesh wounds. Organs missed by a mile. But Gally has a sneaking suspicion that is from efficiency than anything else—aiming for something vital might take an extra second. A second that Thomas doesn't seem keen on wasting.

He wasn't concerned with maiming or causing pain. Thomas doesn't want prisoners, no. What he wants is time.

Newt hasn't made a noise except for his constant cacophony of coughs, breaths coming out through tight wheezes. When there's a moment to spare, Gally glances at him. Newt's expression is filled with nothing but curiosity, a devastated kind of awe, and certainty.

He'll never understand these shanks.

They get on the elevator, a jingle playing above them as blood and sweat drip down their bodies.

When they get to the 21st floor, Thomas takes a deep breath, cupping his hands over his mouth as he continues his sprint. "Teresa!"

His voice echoes along WICKED's walls, climbing higher and higher until it peters out to nothing.

"Teresa!" he screams. It sounds like his throat is tearing itself apart. "Get out here!"

A handful of soldiers step out, drawn by the noise, and by the time Gally gets one of them, Thomas is already stepping over three bodies.

"Teresa!"

Newt falls in step with Gally, breathing heavy from running and skin drenched in sweat, he coughs hard enough that he almost loses his balance. "He really wants to find this Teresa girl,” he pants, complexion pale and wan. “Is Tommy alright?”

Gally tries to laugh, but he can’t even muster a smile.

Thomas nearly smashes the med wing's button into pieces, door opening obediently. Emergency lights flash red and yellow, dousing everything in tones that makes it hard to see what's blood and what's not. Even more soldiers greet them, but it seems like they've heard what happened, because they fight with hesitation and unease. They look at Thomas like he's a meteor, an inevitable force of destruction that they have no choice but to meet. At one point, an idiot made an attempt to grab Newt.

The three of them are surging forward before the body hits the ground.

Throughout the bloodshed, Thomas is screaming, again and again, as if he can personally summon Teresa through volume alone. "Teresa—" he calls, but it's nothing but a rasp at this point. Gally sees how his hands clutch at his gun like an anchor, like he'd float away if it was taken from him.

They turn the corner and stop.

His usually spiky hair is flat, his skin is gaunt, his eyes filled with a deep and unmistakable horror that Gally can see from here, but there's denying the bastard who just threw a WICKED soldier straight through glass paneling.

"Minho?" Thomas whispers, taking an unsteady step forward before rushing forward to pull him into a tight hug. "Fuck, man."

Minho turned slowly, shaking so hard it looked like he was vibrating. "Thomas?" he asks, voice brittle and hoarse, as if it hasn't been used in days. "Is this real?"

Gally's chest is threatening to spill over with pure emotion and he can't help but move to grab Minho's shoulder, not quite having the courage to go in for a hug but unable to keep himself distant. "Hey, you dumb shank."

Eyes widening comically, he has to hold Minho steady so he doesn't topple over. "Fucking Gally?"

"Just can't get rid of me, can't you?" Gally grins, and he knows they should get moving, but it just feels so good to have these three within arms reach of him again.

Three?

Gally turns and sees that Newt hasn't moved an inch. He looks pleased, but he looks pleased for them. "You're Minho, yeah?" he asks, the smile he’s attempting falling flat as his face is flushed scarlet, fever truly settling in. "Glad to see you're alive, mate. These two were worried about you."

Gally turns back in time to see the grin slip off Minho's face. "Newt?" he mutters before recognition clicks behind his eyes. Minho pushes Thomas off him with a fury. "You useless shank, you let him get the fucking Flare?

Thomas' eyes harden. "You think I wanted this?" he asks, voice low, the relief melting away for swift anger to take its place.

"What I wanted was for you—" he prods at Thomas' chest, hard. "To take care of that self-sacrificing bastard, and now—"

Newt shoves Minho’s finger away, weak but unwavering. “You don’t get to talk to him like that,” he snaps, ire dripping in every word.

Minho’s flinches and is about to retaliate when Gally cuts in. "Not the fucking time," he hisses. "We gotta go. Thomas here called enough attention for—"

He interrupts himself at the sound of the entrance door sliding open, a plethora of footsteps falling in time with each other. "Shit."

"Spread out." The voice is unmistakably Janson's. "These rats aren't going anywhere. Put this place under lockdown."

The four of them look at each other, tempers momentarily forgotten. "Run?" Newt asks.

Minho takes the lead this time, turning left and right with a confidence that Gally can almost imagine came from running the Maze for years. But despite that, he's not running with the same gait that he had before—there's no injury but he's sluggish and shaky, none of the easy confidence that Gally had associated him with.

He skids to a stop as soldiers approach him, and when they attempt to backpedal, more soldiers flank them from behind.

"Oh, shit."

Thomas grabs the handle to the door behind them and forces it open. "In here!"

They scramble in and with Minho's help, close the door off with a built-in locking pole. With the way they're banging and slamming on the metal, it wasn't going to last long.

Gally swivels around to take in the room. It looks nothing more than an average storage unit, file cabinets and medical supplies littering the shelves that go up into the ceiling. The wall opposite to them is sheer glass, overlooking the beautiful landscape of the Last City.

"Now, I may be under the impression that I'm losing my marbles," Newt starts, and relief washes through him. Newt may be losing huge swathes of his memories, but at least he's not hostile. "But I think we have a few violent bastards on our tail and we're bloody stuck in what looks like a shitty doctor's clinic."

"You used to be the optimistic one, Newt," Minho grits out.

"Can't be the judge of what I used to be, mate."

"Minho," Thomas and Gally offer in unison.

"That's what you're focusing on?"

Gally turns to glare at him. Can you quit joking around? sitting just behind his teeth. But what he sees is Newt leaning against the wall next to the door, sucking in deep breaths like he can't get enough. Black lines trail from his pulse points and crawl up to his cranium, temples lined with black as if they were sweat trails, and he barely looks like he can stay on his feet. His retort dies in his throat. Even now, always jokes, always humor.

"Newt," Thomas grabs his shoulders, peering closely at his face. "Talk to me."

“I’m fine,” he tries, but can’t even make it through his own words before he turns sideways, spitting more black liquid onto the floor. “Fine. Just fine.”

“Come on,” Thomas shakes him, insistent. “Try again.”

"Not sure what I can say, Tommy," he breathes, smile still plastered on. "Other than I'm feeling—not my best—"

"I know," he drops his forehead to Newt's for a moment. "I know. Almost, okay?"

Newt nods and Thomas pulls back, expression drenched in vitriol. Without saying a word, Thomas grabs what looks like a helium tank, and spins, using the momentum to lift it off the ground.

Gally and Minho, fully aware of Thomas' nonsensical plans at this point, just barely moves out of the way as he throws the tank straight through the window. The three of them watch as it falls, and falls, and falls, before landing clean into a deep, decorative pool, twenty-one stories below them.

Thomas looks at them expectantly. "You'll survive."

Minho gapes at him. "You're fucking kidding me."

"It's either this—" he gestures through the broken window. "Or that." The banging on the door ceases for a moment, before something that sounds horribly like a chain being started up rings out.

Thomas marches over and grabs Newt. "You two go first," he tells them. "Then we'll jump."

"Why do you get Newt?" Gally demands.

"Because if someone gets Newt, then one of you gets stuck with me."

He can't argue with that.

Minho gives Gally an odd look. "You take care of these bastards while I was gone?"

"Not like I had much of a choice."

Despite everything, he barks out a laugh. "You're alright, man."

Kicking the remaining glass out of the way, Gally and Minho nod at each other before taking a step forward, knees bent, ready to run, to jump.

He hears it before he sees it.

It's a particular sound. Newt, had he been in the right state, probably would have recognized it right away. Gally knows the sound, has broken through enough door to know the satisfying, final crunch of a lock giving up and a door sliding open.

Janson enters, eyes ablaze and stun gun cocked, eyes scanning the four of them before landing on Thomas.

Unexpectedly, Newt lets out a deep, guttural sound that almost has Gally covering his ears. It's unnervingly animalistic, violent, predatory. Inhumane. "No."

With a speed that's faster than Thomas and a strength that outstrips Minho on a good day, he launches himself directly at Janson.

Time slows down.

Minho, carried forward by his own momentum, is out of the window and can only look back at the scene in pure horror as he dives.

Newt and Janson brawl it out, Janson clearly unprepared for Newt but holding his own well enough to pull out a dagger from his back pocket.

Thomas is immediately surrounded by soldiers, screaming for Newt, arms outstretched as he gets pinned down, sections of his body aglow as he gets tased repeatedly. Just before he loses consciousness, Thomas cranes his neck at Gally, gaze loaded.

It's like he was back in the Maze again, watching as Grievers stormed into the Glade, sees his Gladers get picked off one by one and he can only fit so many of them in the Box.

Thomas would be dead weight, surrounded by three soldiers. Newt might be truly Cranking out, but he can still be convinced, and he's only against Janson. It's obvious. The choice is obvious. Not only that, but Thomas is basically handing the answer to him on a silver platter.

Still mid-jump, Gally grabs the window paneling and, using all the strength he has, redirects his momentum to swivel back into the room and sends a punch directly into a WICKED soldier's jaw.

Fuck Thomas.

With a hardened fury in his core, he kicks Janson in the abdomen, sending him sprawling out onto the floor.

Fuck Newt.

A gun cocks behind him and Gally doesn't think twice before ramming the guy straight into the wall, fumbling for the gun and throwing it out the window, hoping it doesn't hit Minho on the way down.

He's done choosing who lives or dies. He's tired of being full of grief for people who are still alive.

Someone gets a good blow in his ribs, and he hisses before he pulls out a pocket knife, sinking it deep into the guy's lungs before kicking him down.

Dammit, he misses his friends.

There's someone who's still tasing Thomas, and his vision blurs red as he grabs the taser and forcibly twists it until the man is tasing himself, over and over, until he finally collapses.

And now that he has them back, they're expecting him to choose between them? To become the executioner, when that's the only thing he refused to be back in the Glade?

Gally doubles over as someone gets another hit on him, this time in the back of his head, and the knife slips out of his hands. That's fine; The knife was getting blunt anyway. He straightens up, feels blood trickling down his nape, and squares with the soldier in front of him, fist raised. They all have their specialty—Gally's just happens to be hand-to-hand.

In ten seconds flat, the guy's on his ass, sporting two black eyes and a missing tooth.

Janson groans somewhere on the ground and Gally's about to shoot him straight through the skull when he hears the footfalls of more soldiers on the way. This irritating bastard has all the luck.

Gally spots Thomas, knocked out clean, hunched over on the floor. Newt's bent over on his knees, barely conscious, holding onto the corner of the desk like it's the only thing keeping him up. His cheekbones are bruised badly and purple fingerprints around his neck that have Gally gritting his teeth. "Newt, buddy?"

No response. Only erratic breathing sounds in the room, with the footfalls getting closer and closer.

Brute force it is. This is gonna suck.

He starts with Thomas. Sinking into a squat, he picks up Thomas with a grunt and tries tossing him onto his back, accidentally dropping him. This shank is a lot heavier than he looks. Clenching his jaw, he tries again, successfully catching his weight by holding him up by the waist. "You owe me, Greenie," he mutters, with a wry smile.

Newt's a lot easier. "I'm going to carry you," he warns him, because Newt's really the only one who's earned his kindness. "Don't Crank out on me, man."

With one arm, he pulls Newt up, relieved for his slender form, and starts dragging the three of them out the window, sweat pouring from every inch of his skin from the effort. For a second, he wonders if they would have done the same with him when they left the Maze, if they weren't taken by WICKED so soon. Would they have left him then? Would they leave him now?

It doesn't really matter. He'd do it for them, anyway.

He looks down. Twenty-one stories. Okay.

Squinting, he can just make out Minho, wading out of the water and going towards—

Gally's eyes widen as he spots a bus. A bus. The bus. Relief is so strong it almost chokes him. There’s people down there, waiting for them. Rooting for them.

He can’t fail now.

The footsteps are practically on top of them, and there's no time to waste. Nerves threaten to fray but he ignores it, steeling his hold on both of them until he's certain he can't slip from his grasp. Thomas on one side, Newt on the other. Gally bends his knees and—

A gun cocks behind them.

Not a stunner. A live pistol.

Janson, that fucker.

“As a gift, I’ll let you leave,” Janson tells him. His breathing is labored, and it sounds like every word is a struggle. “I’ll let you jump out of that window. I’ll even give you a head start before I send my men after you. In return, you leave Thomas on the ground.”

Gally doesn’t turn around. He can’t jump faster than Janson can shoot. Despite the ache in his arms, he doesn’t move to adjust the boys in his arms. Can’t reach for a weapon. “Thomas getting the special treatment, as always,” he responds eventually.

“Drop him.”

“Can’t do that, man.”

Janson fires at the ceiling, and Gally can’t hide the full-body flinch that courses through him. In his arms, Newt lets out a rasp, a slur of incomprehensible words, focus flickering back into his eyes.

“I was being kind, you know. But now,” he hears Janson take another step, glass crunching underneath his boots. “I’m just sick of you kids.”

“Let me go,” Newt grates out, almost inaudible. “Gally. Let me go.”

“Shut up,” he says sharply. He can’t deal with this right now. “No altruism for five fucking minutes.”

“I don’t know you, but you know me.” Newt twists his neck, imploring and urgent. “Trust me.”

“I do know you, and I know you’ll probably do something stupid.”

“I won’t, I can’t,” he insists, eyes darting to Thomas’ unconscious face. “Take him and jump. I’ll be there.”

“And if you’re not, then what?”

Newt only gives him a helpless look. “I’ll be there,” he repeats.

Gally grits his teeth, frustrated and bitter and so, so exhausted of having his choices dwindle again and again no matter what he does. Stop, he wants to implore him. Stop trying to leave us.

Instead of answering, he subtly nods, nothing more than a twitching of his head, before letting go of his hold on Newt.

It’s strange how the Flare affects its victims. Death, the obvious one. Darkened veins and memory loss, heightened strength and rage. But what’s strangest of all is its speed.

Newt moves almost faster than Gally can follow, hurling towards Janson like a comet. Dodges the first shot, dodges the second.

A speed that’s monstrous, inhumane, yet is identical to that of Thomas. As if he can’t look at Newt at his worst and see Thomas, over and over; a body and its shadow, inseparable in every way.

Gally doesn’t hesitate. He jumps, Thomas in his arms, and hears a third shot, imploring the universe that Newt dodged that one, too.

“Jump, Newt!” Gally screams, begs, as they fall, wind whooshing in his ears until he can barely hear himself. Grief, once again, threatens to eat him alive. “Please.”

—

He doesn't even feel the impact when they hit the water. His body was cold longer before the landing.

It's only his body's instinct that has him kicking his feet, tightening his hold on Thomas as he all but seeps the very last bit of his energy to take them to the surface.

Are they alive?

It’s that question that gets him moving again, to go past his limits and drag Thomas’ body up, up, up, until someone dives in and grabs Gally and Thomas by their harness and drags them up to the surface. When they break free, Gally gasps, sucking in the air that his lungs are begging for.

Brenda’s dragging him to the edge of the pool. "Missing one,” she gasps, hair flat and breathing hard to the point where she can only let out a few words at a time. “Where?”

"Janson came in—" Gally had to stop, air too scarce in his lungs to speak. “Self-sacrificing idiot. Said he’ll jump—”

Still holding onto the two of them, she wades to the edge of the pool where Minho was pacing, droplets falling with every move he makes. "Newt?" he demands.

Gally pulls himself out and points up, trying to calm the shake to his voice. “Any minute now.”

They haul Thomas onto the concrete first, Gally pulling himself up. They crane their necks, seeing only blackness through the broken window. From this distance, they can’t hear anything even if they strain. “Should we go up there?” Brenda asks anxiously.

Minho shakes his head. “It would be too late.”

“Don’t say that,” Gally interjects, unblinking as he refuses to tear his gaze away from the dark square above them. “It’s Newt. He said he’ll jump.”

“He said he’ll try,” she rebukes. “Right? There’s a difference.”

Minho's eyes flash with pain. "Does—" he glances at Thomas. "Does he know?"

Gally shakes his head.

They all fall silent.

"Shit," Brenda says, summing up their thoughts.

It was at that moment that Thomas' eyes fluttered open. "Newt?" he rasps before he can even take a full breath.

In a moment of hope, or stupidity, or a sliver of childishness that he just can’t get rid of, Gally expects Newt to come flying out of the window.

Instead, silence reigns.

"Newt." Sitting up, he grips Gally's neck, voice low and sinister. "Where is he?"

Gally swallows, and opens his mouth to answer, when the speakers blare out a tune. An announcement.

It was at that moment that he knew Newt wasn't jumping down. A dull ache, the sharp blade of truth. Wave after wave of grief, and in this moment, he drowns.

"Thomas," Janson's voice rings out, brooding yet tinged with amusement. "I hope you enjoyed the lovely swim just now. You kids are just so clever, now aren't you?"

Thomas' grip on Gally slackens as utter horror eclipses his face. "No," he whispers. "Please, no."

"But you can’t leave. Not without him." Janson goes on, and he actually lets out a laugh this time. "Newt? The Crank? You do know how to pick them, don't you?"

Unsteadily, Thomas gets on his feet, staring at the sky, like Newt would be written in the skies, somewhere.

"It's simple. I want you to come back here, alone, and I'll consider giving him back to you. How does that sound?"

"Thomas," Brenda mutters. “Don’t.”

"If I find out that you brought anyone along—any of your little rats for pals, vermin for allies. Well, I suppose your Newt here won't have much time left, either way." A pause, as if he was savoring the moment. "You have half an hour."

The tune plays again before the world falls back into quiet.

Gally closes his eyes, mind spinning as adrenaline shoots through every inch of his body, like it was preparing to fight. But there’s no fight—that would be too easy, a mercy, to use his fists or knives or guns for this. Words are not his weapon to wield. That’s always been Newt’s, Thomas’. The way they can embroider syllables into tapestries of new meanings, can twist and embellish a conversation until it’s in an entirely new direction. He can’t do that.

But fuck, he said he’s going to care. And this is care.

Squaring his shoulders, he faces Thomas. “I’m going with you.”

Either Thomas doesn’t hear him or chooses not to. He goes to a nearby WICKED soldier, unconscious and half-sunk into the pool, and rummages through his pockets, shoving various items into his own. His movements are efficient, clinical.

"You can't go alone," he insists. "It’s a trap.You’ll die, he’ll die. Do you understand what I'm saying?"

Thomas’ response is picking up a stun gun and checking its voltage, nodding to himself.

Gally clenches his jaw. "I know you don’t want to test Janson’s threat. I know what Newt means to you. But Thomas, if you go, you're dead. You get that?"

No response.

“Newt would die. For nothing.”

Thomas turns to him, face contorted and eyes bright with tears, unspeaking

“And it would be your fault.”

It was like all the air around them was sucked away, with how Thomas gasps and begins clawing at his own throat. He collapses onto his knees, hard, holding so tightly to the gun that it seemed almost an extension of him.

Gally sits next to him, his joints screaming in relief at the momentary respite. “You’ll let us come?”

Instead of answering, Thomas reaches into his breast pocket and hands Gally the note.

Gingerly, he plucks it from his fingers. It’s wet, on the verge of ripping, but still intact against all odds. With a delicate tug, it reveals Newt’s careful calligraphy staining the page:

To Newt,

Don’t be a twat to this one—Tommy is the love of your life.

Your Crank self, Newt

“A note,” Thomas finally says, the rhythm of his words are cut with unsteady pauses like the first few droplets before a raging typhoon. “If a note is the only thing I have to remember Newt by...”

The implication enters Gally as if through a vein, the reality settling into his bones.

Thomas isn’t going to change his mind.

Minho marches forward, pulls the note from his hands, crumples it up, and throws it into the pool. Somewhere behind them, Brenda lets out a slew of shocked expletives. Thomas only stares at where it steadily sinks underneath the water.

Grabbing Thomas by the forearm, he pulls him up, getting right in his face. "Listen to me, you dumb idiot,” Minho spits, harsh and violent, like it would be enough to erase his own despair. “I've been gone awhile, I know, but I'm going with you to help Newt. I'm saving him. A note? To remember him by? There’s no fucking way I heard that right, because that sounds like you’re giving up.." He shakes him roughly. "Are you giving up?"

Thomas slowly looks up at Minho. "Never.”

“Good—”

“If a note is the only thing I have to remember Newt by,” his expression is almost calm. “Then you can stop worrying about me. You never have to worry about me again.”

Minho pauses, suddenly unsure.

“If I go alone," Thomas says in that same strange tone. "You'll stop me?"

"Yes, obviously—"

Quicker than he can process, Thomas pulls up his stunner and tugs on the trigger on Minho. He collapses on the ground, seizing, before he stills.

Gally stares down at Minho’s unconscious face and can’t muster surprise. Cold dread coats his nape.

“Thomas—” Brenda starts. Scared, Gally notes idly. She’s scared.

He turns to her, expressionless. "Put him on the bus. Take him to Fry, with the kids."

She's about to speak, but he shakes his head. "You can't leave him here." And, with a stillness and poise that he isn't used to seeing on Thomas, he points to stunner on Gally. "You chose me?" he whispers, words edged with a silent fury. "When you promised you'd choose him?"

Gally clenches his jaw. "I chose both of you," he admits. "But Newt—he saw an opportunity and he—"

Thomas' mouth twists and his features form into something oddly, gut-wrenchingly familiar. It's the exact same look that Newt has whenever he loses his memory, just before he loses himself to something that’s definitely unhuman. “Thanks. For everything until now” Thomas takes a deep breath. “But you can’t come, Gally. I can’t risk losing him. You know I can’t.”

It’s a concession, almost. It comes as a sudden truth that Thomas isn't doing this because he hates Gally. He's doing this to save Newt. And for that, Gally finds that he can't really fault him in doing this.

The pull of a trigger, and every inch of Gally's body is encompassed by wave after wave of electric current, until his vision falls into a blissful dark.

[cherryrockpops]

░▒▓█ Then and Now █▓▒░

For my OC - Nicolas B

Where to start... honestly I didn't jump on Cyberpunk until a year after it's release, and it wasn't until my 3rd run that I actually invested time into my character's design and backstory. I won't be sharing pictures of those previous two, but just to give you a taste of my humor, they were gag characters; Corpo Bill Nye the Cyber Guy, and then Streetkid Avril LaV.

Nicolas, my Nomad baby, is my first true OC in Night City. I gave him the alias/last name "B" mainly because it was the closest sounding letter to "V". However it also tied in well in being ex-Bakker. He's based off of no one in particular and grew naturally as a character the longer I played and interacted with the fandom. (OC QnA mainly) Back then, I was way too nervous to try mods and only stuck to vanilla PM, taking shots at every turn I could in the story without any ReShader or High Res programs. Below is one of my favorites from back then.

During the development of his lore, I wrote his story to specifically revolve around 2023 and planned for him to die in the bombing while helping Johnny. However, due to some people who didn't like this idea, and from my desire to have my OC hang out with other OC's/V's, I chose to design a much older version. Nicolas '77

From there, I finally got into using mods etc, and changed my story around where I would have 3 Nicky designs in total. Streetkid teenager Nicky for 2013, a city Nomad Nick for 2023, and a Dark Corpo styled Nicolas for 2077. I didn't plan for all version to utilize each lifepath, but it did. I will point out though that Nicolas is more Nomad than anything.

It wasn't until a year later that I finally started to settle on his canon story. Through RP and continuously detailing him out, a dark horse came along and Silver B was born. He is more AU specific than actual canon, but I still want to include him in this post. In this AU, he loses and arm to an assassination attempt and ends up getting a chrome left arm. I also used it as an excuse to play with more mods ^w^

Now it's 2 years later (coming up on 3) and I've continued my VP journey. Ranging from memes, photoshoots, abstract and comic panels. I also still do Digital 2D Fanart, but it's more spaced out in comparison. The one below is my only fanart to myself of Nicky, aiming for the body form I truly see him in along with the cleaned up hairstyle.

So wrapping it all up, this is his canon summarized.

Arrived in NC in 2012

Became a Roadie for Samurai before they signed on with a label

Worked as a Techie Merc/Thief until 2023

Designed and built the bomb for Johnny's Arasaka Tower Raid

Disappeared off-grid for 50 years due to the loss he (believed) he caused

Returned to the surface when he hears whispers of Silverhand and the Relic, along with news of Kerry's attempted suicide.

Reconciles with Johnny and the rest of the band members before choosing to go off with Alt in cyberspace.

In other OC's universes, I've also given Nick an "NPC" role. He randomly spawns in various bars and alleyways in NC, offering to craft you items based on the scrap you provide him. In the event that you are low on scrap, you can buy weapons and tech outright, but he would charge additional along with taking more than just a day to get it done. I've played around with the idea of making him his own romance route, but I've yet to flesh that out.

Anyways, if you read until the end, thank you so much for taking the time. I don't often have the chance to talk about Nicky in detail, but it was a lot a fun revisiting how far I've come with him and my VP.

[444lpblue]

The Witch and the Beast - First PV Impressions

Director: Takayuki Hamana Character Design: Hiroya Iijima Animation Work: Yokohama Animation Lab

The day has come! The Witch and the Beast trailer popped out of nowhere while I was watching anime, and I had to pause to fully take in the trailer and the staff list. When I first saw Yokohama Animation Lab, I wasn't exactly happy. I have limited experience with their work, and in terms of anime studio years, I would say they're fairly new. They don't really have enough animes for me to fully grasp their style. I've only finished The Genius Prince from them and seen clips of 'The Great Cleric, which genuinely looks kind of awful, if I'm being honest. So, I was extremely anxious as soon as I saw Yokohama Animation Lab as the studio.

But the trailer footage was better than what I personally expected when I saw it. It still had some things that made me feel iffy, but there were also some genuinely good points.

I think the up-close shots look great. The facial structure and expressions match the manga extremely well, and you really feel like you're seeing the characters come to life. A lot of personality shines through in the close-up shots, from Guideau's intensity and craziness to Ashaf's enigmatic smile. The character design took me multiple rewatches to get used to, but I really did end up enjoying it a lot. I also enjoyed the music choice for the trailer.

The trailer was quite short, so we couldn't really judge the animation or talk about most things in depth, and so far I have no major complaints about it. However, I did want to talk about one thing.

I feel like some of the color choices in the trailer felt too faded or toned down, which betrays the complexity and detail of the scenes in the manga. The black and white frames in this shot feels out of place as they don't mesh well with the overall faded-out scene. I understand that they are aiming for a storybook aesthetic, but I believe they should have made these types of scenes denser in color, even vibrant, to create a contrast with the generally grim environment of all the scenes outside of them. The covers for the series serve as a good showcase of this, with vibrant scenes that are highly detailed and beautiful, complemented by dark shading.

On to the specific staff announced, for the character designs we have Hiroya Iijima, who I feel is mostly doing a good job. The faces of the characters seem to look very close to the art style of the manga. I do feel it's lacking a bit of flair that we've seen from his character designs in Afro Samurai, but I think it's still very good. I'm not extremely familiar with Takayuki Hamana and have never watched any anime he's directed, however from what I understand he tends to bring a group of animators with him, like Yuuta Kiso, who appears in a majority of his projects. I also hope he returns here, as he's a very talented animator. Now, back to Hamana. I've checked some of the openings he's done for Sorcerous Stabber Orphen in order to get a sense of his style, but none of them really impressed me all that much. I still can't get a good grasp on his style, and there's nothing indicating that he would do well in Witch and the Beast, in particular.

The most worrying part for me is likely the studio, Yokohama Animation Lab. As I've mentioned before, they haven't done much to show what they're fully capable of, and a lot of their animes currently out are rather subpar. However, this trailer does look better than a lot of the previous PVs I've seen. I am worried about how many animes they're currently working on, though.

The staff/studio worries me slightly; however, the PV, as short as it is, did look mostly positive, so I will be cautious but hopeful for this upcoming adaptation.

[cryptidsurveys]

Saturday, November 23rd, 2024.

Are you dreading anything coming up within the next few days? No. The next few days involve visiting the Mountain Park, volunteering, seeing a movie with my mom (therapy was canceled, so there's time for me to go after all), and lots of cooking and baking to get ready for Thanksgiving. Oh, and it might snow/rain on Wednesday into Thursday. It should be a pleasant time.

Do you have trouble reading small fonts? Oh gosh, I remember posting surveys in teeny tiny fonts you needed an electron microscope to read. These days, especially when it comes to YouTube comments, I find myself zooming in to make the text bigger/easier on my eyes.

Are you ever so eager to know what happens in a book / movie / television show that you willingly “ruin” it for yourself by either reading ahead, fast-forwarding, or even reading “spoilers” online? I occasionally read reviews before settling on a book and sometimes those contain spoilers. I've also watched (reaction/summary) videos pertaining to books I later went on to read. I guess it's not so much that I seek out spoilers, but that I don't necessarily care or feel as though a book is ruined for me if I know the ending or various plot twists beforehand.

Do you find yourself addicted to a specific beverage or food item one week, & then you tire of it the next after having had it so frequently? Naw. I'm a pretty repetitive eater. I can eat the same basic/staple foods for months, even years, without growing tired of them.

Is there anything special to you about the current month? Thanksgiving. And the fact that I just enjoy November in general.

Are there any old [as in, no longer on television, not necessarily old in terms of years] television shows that you could happily sit through & re-watch the entire series? Mmm, I don't think so.

What was the last flattering thing someone did / said to / for you? - Kristen complimented me on my newly buzzed hair, and Leslie and Iris joked that they wished they could pull off the style (implying that it looked good on me). - Iris said the pie I brought in yesterday was her favorite so far. Everyone devoured it and I got a lot of compliments on that as well.

Do you know anybody that believes that magic / witchery truly exists? Yeah.

Have you ever had any interest in the Salem Witch Trials? Not really.

In terms of writing implements, are you more likely to use a mechanical pencil, ordinary pencil, or A PEN? Does it all depend upon what you intend to write with it? A pen.

Do you keep a whiteboard or paper on your refrigerator to list necessities for future shopping trips? No. I just use a little notebook…which I recently misplaced.

Roughly how hot are the summer temperatures where you reside? 90-100*F.

Excluding surveys, what is something you waste a lot of time doing? Watching YouTube.

Do you find watching animals in their natural habitat to be exciting & fascinating? This is more of a case of an animal that's not in its natural habitat, but a feral cat colony established its territory around our house + our surrounding neighbors. It's definitely interesting to watch them go about their business.

Of all the decisions you have thus far made in your life, which was the best & which was the worst? Best decisions: volunteering, seeing and sticking with my current therapist, and deciding to give recovery another chance. Worst decisions: I know getting sick in the first place wasn't necessarily my fault, but I wish I had recovered much sooner. I've wasted so much of my life on self-hatred/self-destruction.

When you go shopping, do you tend to go to the left side of the store, the right, or do you aim for a particular aisle right off the bat? We tend to go to the right and make a general loop around the store, popping into aisles when we need something, finishing off with the frozen section right before we leave.

Do you generally come home with more than you intended to buy when you go shopping? Not that often. I do buy a lot more "fun/treat" foods during the holidays, though, and sometimes I go a bit overboard.

Has anything exciting, whether big or small, happened to you today? Not really.

If you were presented with a bowl of fruit with apples, oranges, bananas, & grapes in it - which fruit would you pick to eat? Grapes or bananas.

Are you looking forward to Halloween, or does the holiday not interest you at all? Halloween just passed not that long ago and I'm already looking forward to next year. If I could live in a cycle of October, November, December, and maybe January forever, I would be so happy.

If a rat scurried across your foot right now, how would you react? I'd probably jump up and let out some sort of muffled/confused/wtf scream. I'm not afraid of rats, but seeing one in my home where it's not supposed to be…well, that's a bit of a different story.

Will you be expecting any company tomorrow? No.

Discarding the fact that they can smell & tend to get dirty a lot, do you like your feet, or feet in general? My feet are ugly, but I do appreciate them for putting up with me.

Do you find great pleasure in making others laugh? Yeah.

When was the last time you were so excited / happy that you jumped up & down? Lol, this morning, Kristen and I were joking about how "excited" we were for deep clean day. She was like, "I couldn't sleep last night because I was so excited. It felt like Christmas." ;D

[retphienix]

Oh nice!

So I had planned on breeding a new team before tackling them again, but I also decided to do my grinding IN their castle for a little bit before doing the breeding (and then after, obviously) and when I got to the boss room I noticed it retained the second form.

So I figured "Oh, I can probably just beat the second form, I'm in a much better position now. Let's try." and I got it pretty cleanly :P

The fight itself is pretty good; Definitely one of the best I can remember in this game but I won't sugarcoat it- my mind wasn't so focused on boss encounter design in a DQM game where you basically zerg your stats up to a billion by breeding :P

That said- heavy melee attacks, a couple debuffs, and every few rounds they toss an AOE that can be dangerous- that's something to counter! Pretty nice!

After we knocked out the boss everything is happy go lucky~

There were a couple lines of dialogue I rather enjoyed- like the framing of the orbs of Loto as being a title granted to the brave who will save/lead this world (a repeat of DQ stuff around Loto) but following that more specifically with "That is why it targets children since they are the future" was pretty cool- I liked that- especially in the context of the DQ spinoff that's always been far more focused on the younger group of DQ fans, I like that :)

Everything's good and great and we're heading home and then we see a spooky image of eyes in the darkness where the spirits are, yippee!

Also I really enjoyed the little credit sequence showing some of the little "scenes" we've had on this adventure. I have mixed feelings on the efficacy of those scenes but I like it! Also smiled at the caravan camp scene but it also just made me wish there wasn't a limit on the camp because GIVE ME MY SUIKODEN STYLE BIG CAMP!!

So. Here is where I am at an impasse. I need to summarize my thoughts on the game (got a good amount of them) and I need to confront that ending scene since I've already admitted I know what comes next.

So here's what I'm going to do. I am going to explain my thoughts on the game As Of First Credits Sequence (now). Then, I am going to ATTEMPT the "second quest" orb collection part of the game.

I say ATTEMPT because I don't know how.... invested, I am.

From the sounds of it it's the "Do you want to grind nearly forever to get level 3 caravan members and max out your monster stats" mode. It SOUNDS like that- and *I* don't *want* to do that in this particular DQM title. But it also has a definitive goal- you're aiming to get the orbs, fight the thing, you get a second credits scene- then you can fight the dragonlord from DQ as a victory lap. I also think there are boss fights against each of the spirits and I do not know if those are challenging or bonus or required or anything about them.

I will ATTEMPT the orb quest, and if it feels too tedious- if it feels like I HAVE to seek out a level 3 sage for teleport just to keep my sanity with all the back tracking (it sounds like a LOT without teleport)- basically if I don't enjoy it after a few hours of trying, I'll cut it there, I'll admit my defeat, celebrate having beaten the main game because this is objectively the main game, the orbs are post game "Max your team!" stuff, and that will be it!

So then, my thoughts on Dragon Quest Monsters: Caravan Heart.

Altogether. It's alright.

This feels experimental as all hell. It's trying to mash a lot of ideas from main DQ titles in a way that I feel is... not altogether working here.

Mainly for me it comes down to two things.

The Caravan aspect is under-utilized, it's a weight around your ankle for the first few hours of gameplay and then it's just kind of "there" for the rest of the game with no real relevance.

Caravan members DO matter, except they kept the basic DQM monster aspect and arguably even buffed monsters to be better than before since their stats seem to explode MUCH faster than in prior titles- so it's??? Kind of just another layer to the gameplay that doesn't feel like it needs to be there and doesn't feel like it adequately adds to anything I'm doing... Kinda.

Early on you're struggling to breath and are excited to find new members that can alleviate your various caravan needs, then you learn better skills and get a decent income and all of a sudden caravan members are just "Here's some bonus damage, here's some bonus healing, here's a map"

Perhaps in the post game where you get stronger variants of each job they will begin to be much more impactful on play, but in base game eeeeeeh.

I do not hate it though. I think it's a failure because the primary impact it had on my gameplay experience was making the beginning hours worse, but, I think the strength of DQM titles is in team building prior to fighting rather than the fight itself- and the caravan is explicitly an expansion of that idea. You have no (real) control over the caravan in combat- so pre-planning is essential to getting the most out of them- this aspect I don't just like- I LOVE.

It's just I pretty much ended up with just "Here's some warriors to hit, and uh... the rest of my caravans sure do have members." because my options weren't too interesting and my monsters far out-performed anything they could do.

The reforming / breeding system is just fucking god awful compared to previous entries, and it does NOT make up for it in any meaningful way on its own merits.

The core issue comes down to the frequency at which you're allowed to interact with the system. Breeding in DQM games is one of the coolest parts of the entire experience- mashing skill sets together to make a new one, mashing monsters together to constantly get new mons you've never seen before- it's THE most fun part.

Not here.

In DQM:CH they retained the level 10 minimum requirement, but then limited your max amount of monsters PERIOD for the entire experience. You get 3 monsters, TOTAL, in the main game, 1 monster in a side quest, and apparently 1 more monster (I think that's it?) in the post game.

I had 4 monsters TOTAL to do breeding with.

Now for proper context, you don't breed the 4 monsters you have together- you collect hearts from random encounters and loot (the random encounter part is "pretty much" how it worked in previous games) and mash 2 hearts into your 1 monster to make that monster become a different monster.

The thing is, the monster limit matters, a lot. Your backup monster does NOT level up, so they can't be bred at all unless you swap to them which you're given practically no reason to ever do that, and you breed, I repeat, by mashing 2 hearts into 1 of your monsters.

This means you HAVE to level up your core 3 party members to 10+ to breed and you can only breed in ways that include your 3 party members.

The problem is hard to describe without an example from a prior game; In previous games "hearts" were just monsters- you had a farm full of monsters. Monsters on the farm leveled up as you leveled up your party (at a reduced rate). And every time you wanted to breed you just mashed ANY 2 monsters (party or not) together.

This meant in previous titles you could go to the starry area and breed 10+ new monsters all at once, having fun exploring the combinations and deciding who you wanted to make your new team out of.

In DQM:CH you breed your main 3 and that's it. There is no way to combine hearts to see new combinations for fun, you preview it on top of your current monster and then decline until you find the 1-3 breeding combinations you'll be doing today.

The severe limitations put on the quantity of breeding you get to do SEVERELY hampers the fun, like entirely- I had no fun breeding in this game. That sucks.

Now the system in place Works. They made the stats you retain more apparent and they made it so when you breed you don't start from "0" and instead you get to keep your skills from level 1 instead of re-learning them. Those are "nice" adjustments, but then where's the fun part? I had no fun.

Moving on though.

DQM:CH overall felt, interesting. The caravan aspect is something I think has potential but it doesn't really do much with it, and the breeding system is revamped in a way that entices you to explore it- only to find you're not really allowed to play with it much to explore it much so it falls flat too.

The game beyond those two features is kind of a "bland" DQM story. While DQM1 was all randomly generated zones, it had 2 things to keep it grounded a bit- each zone ended in a beautifully designed reference location to previous Dragon Quest games which gave each zone a little memorable scene- and Great Tree itself was a fantastic hub world that evolved as you progressed and gave the entire game a lot of identity.

DQM2 repeated the hub world sense of "life" with Great Log, but also gave each of the zones you explore a little mini narrative to solve along with their unique aesthetics like the desert world and ice world etc.

DQM:CH on the other hand is like.... a really low budget retreat of Dragon Quest's hub. No place feels like it has any real life going on, no place feels real, the whole game /feels/ like "overworld walking" with nothing going on. Perhaps part of this is how towns were handled, but in general the feeling was omnipresent. You get a basic goal at the very start and then just sorta walk forward until it says you won, I don't know, maybe I'm being a hater but I didn't really get the same charm I see in the prior 2. No place to consider my caravan's home*, no location that evolves over time in meaningful ways and gives you a reason to talk to anyone, nothing beyond "Walk forward until you finish" pretty much. :/

*Speaking of home, the camp just felt like a missed opportunity. I keep bringing up Suikoden but I mean it, what a missed chance to let us make a big dragon quest home base with tons of classes! On top of that, the camp isn't a fun place to be. Great Tree and Great Log are fun- they have tons to explore and they have interesting changes over time. The camp can get a couple buildings added if you recruit specific jobs. That's it. No one has anything interesting to say, and you're forced to return A LOT despite that.

And every time you return you do the same few things. Save the game through a ton of dialogue at the church tent. Talk to old lady or merchant to restock rations through a TON of dialogue. Sometimes talk to the camp dude to reorganize your caravan through a TON of dialogue. Sometimes breed your monsters through a reasonable amount of dialogue. And then when you want to leave you just go- wait- wait no you don't. You can't just go. You HAVE to go talk to Luin who will ramble for a calendar year about hints of your current quest EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. Before asking if you want to leave, or leave and bring the camp along.

Going to the camp sucks eggs.

Anyways, positive stuff, the gameplay kinda hits the mark. You do get "too strong really quickly" but that's okay! It's fun leveling your guys and forming your party around roles and (when it lets you) breeding some new monsters, and the quest is straight forward the whole time- almost always "Hey, there's a dungeon to tackle and it's kinda tough, go do that" or "Hey, can you collect these 5 things? Go find em" and that's chill since every quest is located in a relatively small zone.

The biggest zone is the end game where you suddenly get the whole world to explore.... except it's for nothing because the end game is just "Go to one of the spirit's homes, come back, okay there's the castle" so- a little weird- but alright.

The straight forward-ness is a bit lacking for excitement, but I was invested the whole time. I was enjoying playing with my monsters and completing each spirit's task, I'd say it worked out!

Anyways I typed too much. My take on DQM:CH is that it's......

mid.

It's experimental and I am giving it some slack for that purpose. It's really slow to start, it's not very charming compared to the previous, it messes some stuff up, but it gives you reasonable tasks and some toys to play with and then you win. It's Alright.

I wouldn't play it again, beyond the bit I plan to try of the Orb Quest. So I GUESS that makes it my least favorite DQM title so far, Joker 1 was more interesting than this one I think.

But being the worst of the series (so far) doesn't make it a terrible game I don't think. Especially considering what sounds to be a pretty meaty amount of post-game stuff to do. Definitely not bad.

Not a fan. 💜