#watched her mummy video because it is relevant to my interests

[astralaces]

get lily orchard the FUCK away from the mummy

[analytic-chaoticism]

HIVESWAP: ACT 1 LAUNCH TRAILER And Press Kit Analysis

When I saw this video in my subscriptions on a humble Wednesday morning I thought the game dropped without warning on a school day and I was going to hypershit into the nth dimension and I’ll be discussing the Hiveswap press-kit exclusive screenshots so buckle up this is probably going to be a thicc bih

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gAEs-NlcRtU 

First, we have the thumbnail, which is great. In case anybody was confused (because I’ve seen a lot of confusion) Dammek’s beam is red, not orange, as in the red/green cherub dichotomy. I really like this piece it’s AesthetiqueTM (which is something I’ll say about this game a lot), I like how they’re just ogling each other as they hurtle through space and time, and I like how you can see Hauntswitch reversed behind Hiveswap. You just know in the Hauntswitch launch trailer we’ll get a reverse of this shot. 

Sorry that the following pictures all got compressed ew

Not much to this besides noting the sacrilegious Signless plush, which is great and I hope will be official merch one day. Just thought I’d point it out because it’s The BestTM and I’ll address now the fact that everything that was branded has been fictionalized (which would have taken a long ass time to change everything which accounts for some delay time) and I’m not sure if they were threatened with copyright or if they were just hedging their bets but that’s what’s happened. 

Oh hey look a mysterious fucking Nuclear MissileTM dropping from the fucking sky. Note that we’re working with a dark blue and light purple palette here (which will be relevant in a few frames). 

These monsters (which I call antiguardians) are either really easily startled (which makes sense because they legitimately don’t have eyes - note that the no-eyes trend has been bucked for animals and adults in Hiveswap so these things are legit just blind I think) or are just as scared as Joey as she is of them (or enemy varieties have different personalities and the T-Rex arm-leg beans are just TimidTM. I can see this one being the case and it’s cool and interesting so hopefully).

The return of the dark blue and light purple palette. We keep returning to these scenes of fear and destruction throughout the first half of the trailer, and @theenglishmanwithallthebananas and I are willing to bet the nuke from earlier was what destroyed Xefros’ neighbourhood, which would explain how everything got fucked up so quick and why he’s so scared in these sequences. 

hi,m., angery,, . 

Bye bitch. In case anyone was interested, the red and green stripes turn blue and yellow for some reason, and whether that’s a nod to trickster palettes or will be developed as colour imagery later is yet to be seen. Also this portal looks... amazing. The art in this game is phenomenal and I really really love the lighting it’s so high quality and everything is good and this portal design is rad.

The closest view of the weird neighbour mansion we’ve seen so far. I can’t say yet how prominently events on Earth will feature during Hiveswap (but for a cohesive narrative with the games playable in either order they have to affect each other somehow, especially considering how what happens on Earth has to be as important and predestined as what happens on Alternia), but we probably won’t see much of this for a while. Looks cool tho. And big. Real big. 

Every good game needs a good death screen. Now I won’t say that antiguardians can’t shapeshift, but all of the ones we’ve seen have flat teeth and don’t have mouths this big, which makes me think this is perhaps the first boss encounter of the game? A giant antiguardian? Maybe an upgrade on the centipede enemy. 

Xefros panicked, traumatized, and roughed up by the destruction of an entire fucking neighbourhood. I’m assuming that the cherub portal survived, if not all of Dammek’s hive - considering that his lusus is still around after this. I hope Xefros’ house was lucky enough to make it too if Dammek’s survived the blast, being across the street from each other and all. If it didn’t... that means bye bye sloth, which will make me real fucking sad (but doesn’t line up with concept art we’ve seen of the sloth walking with the trio, unless that’s been changed as we haven’t seen it in the trailers). Of course, this could be another neighbourhood, as we saw the destroyed areas in concept art from Dammek’s lusus’ back, meaning they already rode it somewhere. Who knows what this is. I just hope the sloth is okay. Please. Also I love Xefros’ hive???? so??????? let them be okay.

What the fuck is this Actual TesseractTM????????? We’ll come back to this later, but we will say now that it’s most likely that Joey finds this on Alternia after arriving at Dammek’s hive (considering it interacts with his doors). @theenglishmanwithallthebananas noted that it looks like a “perfectly generic object but useful” which is so true and thematically really interesting (and likely intentional). I can’t wait to see more with this Mystery BoxTM. 

In case anyone was confused like I was, Jude’s text is now light green and Joey’s light blue. This palette swap is the same as John and Jade’s and I love it. I don’t know when this change was made but I never noticed and I am here for it. There’s some gerbil tubes on the wall, so unless those are used for a transport system, the Harleclaires have more pets than Tesseract and

OH MY GOD I JUST REALIZED THEIR DOG WAS CALLED TESSERACT AND

WHAT DOES JOEY FUCKING FIND

God fucking dammit I swear to God... If the likely plot-critical Glow CubeTM is actually called ‘the tesseract’ I’m going to have a conniption of fucking course this would happen. ANYWAY. Potential rodents, not just Tesseract and the pigeons. Also notice the captain mummy off to the right who survives to become one of Grandpa’s esteemed foyer couch guests. 

This is possibly an entry-level style of puzzle, where Joey dances hard enough to JiggleTM the environment and Make Things HappenTM. A cool use of her dancing mechanic I really like it. 

Y O U T H R O L L also???????????????????? why is Dammek such a fucking nasty boy? We’ll see how fucking FilthyTM it gets in the next frame but he really needs to do some dishes (I’m not sure how he affords them all as a bronze but he also has 1000000000000 guns so hey). I love his deercat lusus so so so much and I want to know how it feels having another of the same lusus taxidermied and used as a fucking sockrack in it’s son’s basement. This is the recording area from promotional art we’ve seen, Xefros and Dammek are cool and good moirails, Dammek needs to do his laundry as well as his dishes, the Bandcestors print exists in-universe, there are some references in the other posters I don’t get, and trolls eat giant bugs in stew which is gross and I’m absolutely not here for it at all. 

Look at all these dishes. And all these guns. Wow are there a lot of guns. I mean I guess rebels need guns but... that’s still a lot to just have lying around. Maybe he has a riflekind specibus. The same dark blue/light purple sky as the missile shot is seen through the window so we definitely know the missile is on Alternia, and we can see one of Trizza’s cool imperial drones skulking around ominously too. I really love their design. Other things of note here are a potential microwave and those cool headphones which curve out for his horns. How are those sold? Horns don’t all grow in the same spot, so are headphones custom made, or are there a set amount of standard areas that horns grow from and you can get different headphone styles designed for each? It’s attached to some sort of Walkman. 

My favourite shot from this trailer. I love Xefros’ room. The lighting is again, fantastic, and also really concerning. Pool balls on the wall, on the floor, in the lights... Obvious connections to LE and it makes sense if you consider Doc Scratch’s involvement. We know Xefros is a Sports BoyTM (we can see his helmet and uniform in the back there) and we know he’s a butler (nice to see the cutlery and proper cutlery position chart on the wall) and I was thinking that billiards is a real sort of refined sport which would align with his gentlemanly image and - if he’s influenced by Doc Scratch, a very gentlemanly aesthetic’d individually who likes to raise proper servants - possible outside interference. I love his little butler suit. His bunk recuperacoon is nice. I like how the UI changes between humans and trolls. I like the telekinesis button design. I like how he has a FLARP manual (FLARPing My Chemical Bromance please), and this writing is fantastic. It really speaks to troll society in a really succinct and witty way which is reminiscent of the earlier Homestuck style and will be great for exposition and I can’t wait to see more. Cohen seems really capable and I can tell the writing will be fantastic already. Also of note is the athlete poster who seems to play the same sport he does based on the gear, and the sexy poster by his recuperacoon. His recuperacoon is a cool shape too, it actually looks really comfy in that reclined upright position. That would be so good for me RN because I am sick and My SinusesTM are Not Happy With Lying DownTM. I absolutely love Xefros’ hive (I just adore those pink and blue trees, and also treehouse houses) so I can’t wait to see more. I really just can’t wait for a lot of stuff.

Rebelgram. I wonder how many messaging systems there’ll be in this game (if we want to count Prongle as messaging). I like the style and simplicity of this UI, as well as text option convenience. Speaking of, we see some rudimentary dialogue choices which I’m sure will get more complex and interesting as the story and relationships progress. Quirk wise, it seems Xefros uses perfect grammar with no capitalization besides ‘X’, removes ‘e’ from ‘ex’ pairs, and uses ‘X’ in his emojis for his horns. I’d like to note that ‘X;)?’ is probably Joey being confused about the use of the ‘X’ as me and @theenglishmanwithallthebananas looked into together last night and Joey could very feasibly be familiar with emojis considering the date of their invention preceding 1994. I’m excited to see more websites in-game, like troll!eBay, which will potentially make for an interesting mechanic. 

Dammek’s bedroom is a mess too. We can see another gun in the foreground as Joey climbs out of this vent (presumably from the basement), and another fucking dish stack. There’s a giant hole in the floor and ceiling from the cherub portal beam. His recuperacoon is fucking WeirdTM and... I honestly have... no idea?????????????? how you get in that or why it has so many oddly placed holes (and speaking of how it retains the sopor slime?). There’s a weird magenta box there and I’m really not sure what it could be. A drum set up the back there, and... are those more guns by the window? Really. Where the fuck did he get all these guns? Troll!eBay? More posters in here: Grubbels on the ceiling on the right, some more deercat lusus stuff. Troll!Judge Dredd. Troll!Robocop. I don’t recognize the two at the back, but I do know the troll!Anarky symbol (I feel like that might specifically be a Batman reference because of the antihero/gritty-inclined superhero theme going on here? Could very easily just be a normal anarchy thing tho). 

Here we see what I think is meant to be a troll!Terminator poster which I swear we saw in HS cuz I remember those horns but I might? be crazy. Another gun is held above the door, which is locked by a biometric bypassed by the tesseract (which goes dark in the next few frames). It’s too small to see because unfortunately these screenshots all compressed, but during this sequence, the cube emits some white sparks, as if the whole ‘lime green and probably really important’ stuff didn’t already make it look related to first guardians/the Green Sun. I’m not sure why it loses power here but... I mean it’s interesting. There’s also a model of a troll getting abducted which is of course A Very Funny CoincidenceTM. From all of these posters I’m getting a very strong Lawless Law, Moral Code, Violent Disestablishment And Vigilante Action vibe for Dammek, which makes sense considering he’s a rebel (potentially a leader??? with all these weapons and the infamy of the Grubbels? with in-world merch? how is that allowed?), and I’m sniffing some Mind on this boy, but obviously that’s super tentative bare bones. 

Wow this is beautiful. 

Fucking same.

So that’s the trailer! I figure I might as well also go over the presskit while we’re here: 

https://www.hiveswap.com/press-kit

None of the info provided here is new, but to recap: Hiveswap takes place in 1994 as a prequel to HS and the birth + arrival of the beta kids on Earth, who will get here in... two years. Enough time for Grandpa to pack up shop and ditch the wife (is Anna Claire still alive?). Every item combination is possible with unique flavour text (I can’t wait to extend the standard 4-5 hour play by testing everything), there’s at least one third wave ska song, frenemies is a possible relationship option (quadrants please and thank you), and Hiveswap and Hauntswitch will be playable in either order. Moving on to those good exclusive screenshots: 

So many dead animals. I find the bear/deer combination quite tasteful myself, as well as the bull head and hooves mounted above the fucking door. Wow that wolf, am I right? Really happy to see ‘play haunting x’ is still a thing, and I’m excited to see what recurring commands/gags pop up in these games. The rug coordination in this household is awful but I love it and the texturing on these things is fantastic. I’d also like to draw your attention to the corned of the shot, in the back corner above the arrow on the piano and behind the stair rails: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GVEQ3v9RRR0

It’s this monster from the concept art in the asset reel that came out oh my God 2 years ago. Anyway, it looks lime green in the former screenshot, and if there’s one thing I know about exotic snake monsters (which we’ll get back to in a second) and Grandpa, this is probably a new denizen minion, and subsequently a hint at a new denizen design! Nothing else on Earth looks this cool, right? With the colouration and AesthetiqueTM I considered this being an Abraxas minion but Abraxas looks - from Jake’s browser - to be bird themed so that doesn’t quite line up, but the prospect of finding minions for more denizens and thus new denizen designs in the Harlehouse is really exciting to me. Basically this is all just Really Fucking ExcitingTM. Also trust me to focus on this one background thing.

Here we see the fight with the centipede antiguardian in the basement which we see later that Joey is in to turn the power back on:

I’m still really here for dance combat and this game’s beautiful art and insane attention to detail. Most of note for me here are the Typheus minion head and what I’m 100% positive is a Cetus minion head (purple narwhal AKA purple whale AKA Cetus). Although Cetus was never shown Rose’s browser showed a human woman head so if denizen minions can vary a bit from their denizens design then perhaps that snake on the stairs up there is related to Abraxas. I feel like of all the denizens to include a nod to, the one associated with the cherubs - so potentially a Yaldabaoth minion too? - makes sense. 

More messy rugs and I still love how ugly and tasteless it is. I also love this little blue lady corner with the tiger skin armchair by the French doors we’ve got here. There is so much illegal game in this house. 

God bless these family photos (pretend Joey is standing on those stairs a little more - I’m fine with the models not quite lining up considering it’s 2D). As we saw in the photo of Grandpa and the buffalo by the piano, it seems Joey and Jude specifically decorate Grandpa’s hunting photos. But I don’t think this is because it unnerves them:

Once again the art and lighting in this game is phenomenal. But Joey seems quite excited by all these dead things so no I don’t imagine the hunting bothers her very much. That’s funny to me because Joey wants to be a vet, so maybe the excitement is just standard for one of her dance cycles and she’s not actually normally very happy about all the dead things. I guess we’ll see. Note the katana below the orange cat. @Dirk next time Grandpa. It’s cool to see more nods to the alphas and the environmental storytelling is going to be great in this game. 

I like how Jude’s calling the antiguardians the cryptid vanguard and I almost want to do the same. 

I only just realized that we’ve seen all this gerbil tubing before but it’s what got me to freak out about Tesseract so I’ll leave that in there. I’m still not really sure how the combat system works at all from what we’ve seen but it looks interesting UI-wise and I really like the death bubbles that pop up at collision points. It’s a cool skull graphic I think we only saw once in Homestuck, and that one on the left looks a bit like the ~ATH face.

Also wow that bat thing has a manly chin.

I love Jude a lot. 

These theatrical encounter screens are still great.

All in all: WOW! SO MUCH STUFF! WOW! GREAT! I’M! E!X!C!I!T!E!D IF YOU HAVEN’T NOTICED. Hopefully you enjoyed my thoughts and I’ve pointed out some details or ideas you might have missed. I’m also sorry for being too lazy to edit out the YT bars on the trailer screenshots but hey whatever.

This game looks so fantastic and I can’t believe it’s going to be here in 13 days after I’ve waited for so long (since 2013) and I’m just... yeah this is going to be cool. 

Stay tuned for more Hiveswap theorizing and coverage, which will only increase by a Whole Fucking LotTM when the game actually comes out. Hopefully I’ll be hot on the scene the day it drops but that’s also a Friday so I might lose some time at school but we’ll see how it goes. 

For reference, I will be tagging Hiveswap spoilers as ‘HS spoilers’ and/or ‘Hiveswap Spoilers’ in the future. 

My Hiveswap theories are here:

Antiguardians: http://analytic-chaoticism.tumblr.com/post/164851214030/hiveswaps-antiguardians-possibly-solving

Horror: http://analytic-chaoticism.tumblr.com/post/158878144610/hiveswap-and-horror-possibility-of-scary-segments

Plot: http://analytic-chaoticism.tumblr.com/post/155283894895/hiveswap-cherubs-fantrolls-first-guardians

The Handmaid/Doc Scratch: http://analytic-chaoticism.tumblr.com/post/154670995195/the-handmaid-in-hiveswap-homestuck-ancestors-in

God Tiers: http://analytic-chaoticism.tumblr.com/post/151553862535/tentative-hiveswap-classpecting 

[vileart]

Queen of The F*cking Dramaturgy: MarysiaTrembecka @ Edfringe 2017

Queen of the F*cking World – Marysia Trembecka

Never be a Princess – be the Queen

Don’t ever be a princess – be queen of your own f*cking world. Join Marysia Trembecka and her wild bass guitar on an audience-empowering ride through the ups and downs of sexual politics and power.

Rocking the audience through the show is a fiery exotic dancer who reveals the story of her work, life and lovers – and why she has the words “Queen of the Fucking World” emblazoned on her dressing room door.

What was the inspiration for this performance?

The character ‘turned up’ whilst I was devising my previous Singing Psychic show into a full hour piece in 2014. I had spent so long putting off fully realising my Singing Psychic character that I knew I had to focus on getting that done, rather than trying to develop two completely different characters and shows.  However the reaction of my fellow improvisers, who were also developing their own work,  to this Queen character who popped up for a second .. to the point of being asked about her 2 years later when I bumped into one of them at Edinburgh Fringe 2016.

All it was a pose, leg on chair looking seductive but the words she was saying – (perceptive and mocking) was diametrically opposed to what her body was saying (selling a fantasy of a woman).

Also years previously I had toyed with the idea of making a show about women and their femininity, what it is to be a woman, how we are critiscised and judged for using our beauty and our sexuality. Having been a bond dealer in the City, to becoming an actress who is often type cast as yummy mummies or crazy strong women – when I play a crazy yummy mummy the film always wins awards, a cabaret artiste and indeed a model, I have always been aware of the seeming pull/push of using ones femininity and sexuality as a woman, how it is a line that we must change depending on the career we are in.

Hence in 2016, after I felt the Singing Psychic was established (4 & 5 star reviews, a Best Show, Funny Women 2016 nomination and European gigs including the official Brit Awards After Party at the 02, I started pulling the strands together.

I did an 8 min showing at a workshop in October 2016 and realising I needed to do a huge amount of research and interviews to fully look at the subject. Depending on ones life experience, marital status, sexuality, economic wealth, education, background: female power is seen as being many things , for some to overuse ones sexuality is seen as ‘wrong’, for others it is the only choice to feeding your children. 

Hence I decided to apply to the Arts Council for funding for the first time, which I received, to include a small research portion so I could interview people from the English Collective of Prostitutes, to the Consultant Gynaecologist who has set up the only sexual health clinic in Scotland that caters largely for sex workers (50% of the clinics clients are Romanian)

Is performance still a good space for the public discussion of ideas?

I believe it can be a more direct connected way of discussing things than watching TV as a passive half interested viewer, tapping on your smart phone at the same time. Live performance, human to human always creates a relationship and it is in that relationship, uncomfortable, confrontational or comic, that discussion for both performer and audience to grow. Being fed even a balanced documentary or discussion watched via a monitor is never the same as feeling the energy live in the room, with the opportunity for feedback and q&a’s.

Given my cabaret and solo theatre viewpoint that the audience should be a living partaking piece of the work, I feel that this discussive energy is even more enhanced. In every show I create I expect to be changed by the audience every night, by their reactions and energy. I also pursue this interaction deliberately by having audience interaction embedded within the show. 

This is true of this new Queen show, getting the audience involved and also having a couple questions I ask them via paper at the beginning of the show, and that I look through live on stage.

How did you become interested in making performance?

I have always written songs, words, characters and told stories. I am an ex bond dealer and have to leave the City as my creativity felt under-utilised, even though talking of the various new economic data or politicians comments as to their impact on FX or bond prices feels as much story telling as anything I now do in a wig!

I am a ‘straight’ actress as well and love telling other stories on film or theatre, but I need to tell my own stories. I started by making cabaret shows, with linking stories between the songs. Each show I have made has become more ambitious in range of medium, subject matter and my reach which in turn has given me the fire to then make more ambitious stuff. 

For example I made over 140 videos as The Singing Psychic , including a 21 episode webseries of the pros and cons of the EU Referendum in June 16, doing all the research myself using my banking background. This led me to then feel I was equipped and able to do the research and pull together the relevant strands to make Queen.

Is there any particular approach to the making of the show?

It all comes from character, listening to the character and the characters around them in their life. I do not feel that I write the characters, more that they come through me. So I play physically, and vocally, improvise in character. For example I was improvising in the character of the Queen’s dresser Marta, in her voice and she said ‘She even has Queen Of The F*cking World on her dressing room door in neon’, hence giving me the title of the show.

Does the show fit with your usual productions?

No. I have never done interviews with various people on their viewpoints and points of specialist knowledge.  From ballet dancers, choreographers, women in industry to strippers, sex workers and actresses they all gave me a piece of a puzzle I then had to choose to build it together and allow the knowledge to inform my character. I also did a huge amount of historical research on women in history such as Emma Hamilton, Lord Nelson’s love of his life to London in Roman times and women as seen through Shakespeare and Chekhov’s eyes.

Feedback was asked for as well unusually from the two showings which was invaluable as to what people wanted more of as well as what was confusing.

I also chose to use my bass guitar, writing original songs as needed such as a Queen Of The F*cking World song which someone asked for. I also used some songs that seemed to have almost been written for the show from my earlier live album IF YOU CANT MAKE LOVE MAKE COFFEE which seemed to reflect Queen’s journey.

I first worked with solo theatre director, Colin Watkeys (Ken Campbell and Claire Dowie) to look at the narrative arc of the work in my Singing Psychic show, and have used him again to help me shape the narrative.  I have also consulted with Phil Ryan, the brilliant singer/songwriter on using my bass with a Roland synth to develop a soundscape as I play.  Mary Hammond, formerly the head of the Royal Academy of Music Musical Theatre MA, who has given me singing lessons over the years, has also been brought in to consult on using the voice as an instrument to further the story.

What do you hope the audience will experience?

My story on modern sexual politics from a historical perspective hopefully will give some new information and education. I certainly have learnt a huge amount from the research and interviews, and realised where I have been judgemental in some areas of my life.  When you talk to a sex worker or a woman having to go on the game to pay for her disabled son’s required care because of benefit cuts, it can open your eyes to what else is going on around. Looking at how erotic dance has gone from being sacred to the profane and how sexual mores have been set has opened my eyes and hopefully my audiences to look at the  topics in a new light.

It is also meant to be super entertaining and inspirational. The core message ‘Don’t be a princess, you gotta be a queen’ is what I want people to leave with singing, seeing how to strengthen that sense of self responsibility in their children and in the way modern rhetoric is used.

What strategies did you consider towards shaping this audiences experiences?

I am focusing on the narrative strand, is there a story here? Can they follow it? Does it make sense? Do the audience hear what I think I am saying? 

I also have two bits of audience interaction, as it is something I love, so that is less of a strategy and more of a MARYSIA TREMBECKA show experience.

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On advice I have added a guitar synth, more tech than I have ever used in a show to make my bass guitar sound different through the show. A bass guitar and a female voice are rarely heard on their own so filling the sound is something I have had to look at.

Trembecka, a former city bond dealer and now actress, draws on a deep well of personal experience in her exploration of the challenges faced by women and the LGBT community in today’s world, and what it takes to rise to the top.

And her conclusion is: “All through history we have been judged by who we choose to sleep with. And the judgements are often made by a certain privileged selection of men who say one thing and do another. It’s time for that to stop.

“The message is simple, whatever your gender or sexuality, never be a princess – unleash your inner queen. I’m encouraging everyone to be queen of their own fucking world, because queens don’t need a prince to rescue them, they can do it themselves.”

Trembecka’s show has been developed with Arts Council funding which has allowed her to interview and learn from a cross section of women including sex workers, strippers and others at the sharp end of 21st century gender politics.

Premiering as part of the PBH Free Fringe, it’s a fierce, dark one-woman theatre-cum-cabaret performance that embraces everything from Shakespeare and Chekhov to RuPaul. There’s also humour, audience interaction and even a smattering of Burns’ bawdry in there too.

It’s also informed by Trembecka’s research into the experiences of women from the past and from literature, including Lady Macbeth.

This new show comes from a consummate entertainer whose Singing Psychic was a hit at last year’s Edinburgh Fringe, toured Europe, earned five-star reviews and a Best Show Funny Women 2016 nomination, as well as featuring at the Brit Awards official after-party.

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