#with everything I know about your self-insert and what she goes through i think it'd be really cool if she got to visit reborn

[nulltune]

five interesting facts about Hakuno & five things you consider uncanny. Go!

THANK YOU SUE FOR MY LIFE!!!! talking abt hakuno is my hobby fr so thank u 4 enabling me ehe <3 here we go!!

5 interesting facts about hakuno:

her name is an annagram of kimi no na hakushi which translates to "your name is blank". i think it's suuper neat because 1. it gives you the impression of it being an insert name here kind of thing that's common for self-inserts, but it's a nice way to start off hakuno's character journey of becoming her own character from a blank slate and 2. it's a pretty straightforward way of telling us that her name, much like herself, is blank. empty. there's nothing there ^_T

speaking of- you know how with mc characters, there's usually a silly haha kind of dialogue option? that's present for hakuno too but i like it because it's more like an illusion of choice than something more like a self-insert thing. the point hakuno makes in the end is essentially the same, she's just being a lil goofy about the delivery, y'know! i'm not even kididng btw sgfkshfj hakuno herself admits sometimes that she did do it to get a rise/see the other person's reaction to it. moon lady's got a lil michievous side ✨️

she knows the sa-shi-su-se-so which is an expression to memorize essential ingredients for japanese cuisine. so it's safe to say that she'd at least know the basics of cooking, though it's a lil headcanon of mine that although she knows it theoretically, she absolutely flops at the execution (and if you wanna make this more nuanced, you can think of this through the lens of food as a love language-)

she "doesn't particularly like octopus". we don't get a reason why, but it's kinda funny when considering the sea motif in fate/extra! maybe hakuno wouldn't like seafood in general? this isn't that interesting but agfkshf we barely get any information about hakuno herself ya kno!!! which makes sense considering she doesn't even know herself, but that's why i treasure these little crumbs !!

i've noticed this in my reread of fate/extra, but i feel like hakuno brings up the fact that she's "not alone" Quite A Lot post chapter 4 or so. it's her only solace after finding out the truth of her existence so it makes sense why that fact is important to her, but i also like to think that repeating it so much is her (likely unconscious) way of trying to cope with how truly lonely her existence is :,)

5 things i consider uncanny:

OH MAN THIS IS A PERFECT THING TO ASK BC there's always hints about something being "off" about hakuno. in hindsight, it's pretty sad when this disconnect with everyone and everything else seems almost inherent to her existence when all she wants is to be a normal human and find her place in the world </3 and spoiler alert: She Is Not and She Does Not. but it's neat!

there's this one hakuno dialogue response that was essentially her introducing herself in an almost automatic "pavlovian response" — it's a small hint about her true nature as an artificial intelligence but i wish we got more of this aspect explored tbh! how much of her is real? how much of her is her? it could really mess up hakuno's head but it'd be hella interesting to see !

her reaction to being felt up by someone as a first meeting was seriously underwhelming ! a lot of hakuno's reactions to things are pretty tame and iirc it's been noted that she's strangely calm for someone in such a high-stress situation (enough to cripple even the finest soldiers, according to rin). it's likely her being so numb to it all tbh ^_T but it's still pretty weird hakunochan!!!

this one's kinda graphic but there's a scene where hakuno tries to reach her servant-- even as her body is literally being broken down and deleted in the process :,) i say it's uncanny because damn it's a great scene but hakuno's thought process behind it all is a widdle fucked up!! look at what she has to say when she goes numb from the pain + her stomach collapsed: "I just feel gross, like I’ve turned into a skeleton-monster. Though with my body being lighter, I’ll be able to walk faster, which is nice." HELLO??!? (bassbooted)

this one comes a ccc anthology chapter but basically hakuno was asked to pose for a photoshoot and she has no problems wearing a suggestive nightgown, a bikini, and a wedding dress but Draws The Line at a maid outfit (girl?) (she ended up wearing it — and absolutely slaying the look, if i do say so myself — but was Very embarrassed)

[moved-to-void-kissed]

safari ball and gs ball for whomever you’d like!! ~zale

Hi @garchompp!! Thank you for these!!~

I think I'll go with my selfship with Luna if that’s alright, since then I know I can give a pretty good answer for GS Ball (my first instinct was to talk about Aria there, but I did that on that other post pretty recently, so.. let’s change things up a bit!)

(question source: this post by jackship)

SAFARI BALL ; have you ever been on a fun vacation with your F/O? where did you go? how did you spend your time with each other? do you have any places on your bucket list where you’d love to go? - It’s pretty safe to say that the current goings-on in the Reborn region have made things a bit too hectic for either of us to take time away - Luna from her role as the Dark-type Gym Leader (particularly given that she’s one of the many Gym Leaders whose reserve leader isn’t ever shown, unlike Aya or Florinia for instance), and Adriana from trying to stop Team Meteor and their plans, especially since Anna specifically asked her to collect all of the Reborn League’s Gym Badges (and given what happens to the only person we’ve seen so far who directly knowingly goes against Anna’s advice.. that girl definitely knows what the best courses of action are for the people she cares about.)

However, once everything is finally sorted out (or as sorted out as it can be, anyway!), I have it planned that Adriana and Luna visit Hoenn for a while together! Mainly since Hoenn is also one of my favourite regions alongside Kalos and Sinnoh. It’s primarily as a getaway from Reborn and everything that they’ve gone through, so that they can both take some time to relax and reflect together, but Adri also takes the opportunity to participate in Contest Spectaculars with her Pumpkaboo while she’s there. I don’t have many of the finer details planned out, but their holiday will probably also include visits to places like Lavaridge for the hot springs and Mt. Pyre for the connections to Ghost-types.

I’m also thinking that we go for a shorter holiday to Galar at some point, mostly because that gives me an excuse to hang out with the many of my friends and mutuals whose self-inserts are based in that region, haha (but also I want Luna to see Ballonlea and Glimwood Tangle, because I think she’d love it there! And since other Dark-type Gym Leaders aren’t very common, but Galar has one, that could make sense for her to want to visit there, too).

GS BALL ; did you have any original concepts for your self-inserts that were scrapped? did your storyline with your F/O go somewhere else than you originally planned? what ideas have changed when creating your relationship with your F/O? - well, Adriana wasn’t particularly fleshed-out as a character to start with, since she was pretty much just “my version of the in-game protagonist” in terms of what she did in the story (hence why she originally used the same name that I used to go by). She didn’t initially have a lot of backstory because of that, until I came up with the idea of letting her be from Kalos since Generation 6 is my favourite of them all (and because I wanted her to have a Shiny Pumpkaboo as her starter/partner Pokémon, because hello they are adorable). That then led nicely into her being a Ghost-type specialist for her journey around Kalos, since in the games, Kalos is the only region without a notable Ghost-type specialist, though a lot of Ghost-type Pokémon that I like are available there. Also, Adriana’s current outfit was originally just supposed to be the outfit she uses for Contest Spectaculars, but.. I got too attached to it and I was able to make it fit her character by tying her to Laverre City (since it resembles the furisode girl Trainer class, but with the colour palette of a Shiny Pumpkaboo!), so now it’s her actual default outfit, haha

As for the storyline of the selfship.. well, it still sticks very closely to the events of the game itself, moreso than most of my other selfships I’d say, and so Adri very much still follows the path of the player character (unlike, say, Noire, who is sort of supposed to replace the in-game protagonists but to a much lesser extent so they probably also exist as characters in their own right too). So, I wouldn’t actually say that that much has changed, since the main changes to the story that deviate from the games (saving Luna from her fate in the game, for instance) are things I had written in from the start.

I think the main things that have really changed are adding in the details about how Luna’s and Adri’s Pokémon teams connect to each other, with Adriana giving Luna the Gothitelle she’s shown with at the Glass Workstation, and Luna then catching a Shiny Mismagius on the way up to the Glass Workstation which she gives to Adri there, plus general sorts of dynamics (like Luna’s Absol and Adriana’s Silvally being friendly rivals of a sort). But, other than that, I don’t think there have been many massive changes.

Thank you again for sending these in, friend!! I hope that my answers were alright and made enough sense, given that it’s so late here, haha~

[luckythereviewer]

So, I already have done posts about Extella and Extella Link, and I think it's about time I finished giving my thoughts about the Extraverse games that came to the west with the game that started it all: Fate Extra.

Now, let's go ahead and address the biggest turn-off for people when it comes to Extra: the combat system. As someone who has played the game multiple times, I can understand where the frustration comes from. I got multiple game overs while playing with Nero as my servant, aka easy mode. However, by the end of the run I played to first beat the game, I came to realize something that would have made the game so much easier. The fact that Skills cancel enemy attacks. It seems the idea was for you to use the Rock, Paper, Scissor's mechanic for attacks you can see while using skills for ones you couldn't predict. Sadly, the game doesn't really do a good job of explaining this. There isn't a tutorial for it like there is for how attack, guard, and break worked at the start of the game. Hopefully, Studio BB learns this lesson and gives a proper explanation for how combat works, considering the combat system in Extra Record seems very much different than it was in Extra.

Outside of that, there isn't much more to say about the combat or leveling in the game, which sucks given how unique the leveling system was. Leveling up to gain points you can spend on enhancing your servant's parameters? That was really interesting, but as of Extella and Link (and possibly CCC since I can't find anything about using Soul Alteration in that game), the Soul Alteration has been left out for a more traditional leveling system.

So, what about the story?

The Story? Is amazing. Still one of my favorite Fate stories. From summoning your servant, to fighting Shinji, all the way up to fighting Twice, this story is very much one that will have you feeling something. The only week I would consider 'bad' is Week 4, and it's obvious why Week 4 is not as great compared to the other Weeks. Week 4 is the point where the game splits between the Rin and Rani route. So, I imagine having to create the same route twice but with different characters was not an easy thing to do. While Monji would go on to have a role in CCC, Run Ru, sadly, doesn't get the same treatment, so if you save Rin, you're stuck facing one of the weakest, in terms of character, Master in the game. Even as bad as Monji is, if you are a Type-Moon fan and know of Arcueid, then you can at least get something out of his fight.

But for the rest of the weeks? Every character you face will make you care about them and sad about their deaths. Shinji, who isn't the same as SN Shinji, Dan, Alice, Julius, Rin/Rani, depending on who you saved earlier on in the game, Leo, even Twice, the man behind the entire Grail War and responsible for all the deaths. Extra did an outstanding job fleshing these characters out and making you care about them in the 7 days they get.

Speaking of characters, let's talk about the main character: Hakuno Kishinami. For the sake of not making this post too complicated, I'll be referring to Hakuno as female since she is my preferred Hakuno. I love them both, but if I had to pick one, it'd be female Hakuno. Now, Extra, being the start of the Extra/Extella Franchise, Hakuno doesn't have much of a character, to the point that people use Extra as a reason for why she's a self-insert character. In Extra, yes. She is a bit of a self-insert character, but even then, we are really stretching the term there. As bland as Hakuno's character may be, there are still moments where we see them trying to show her as an actual character. From the infamous line "Rin goes from comatose to bitch in three seconds flat," to Hakuno noting how Leo has balls of steel, to Hakuno even crying for Julius at the end of the last fight with him during Week 7 after finding out everything he went through. Not to mention Hakuno addressing Twice. She isn't your typical hero who fights Twice because he's evil or what he is doing is wrong. She doesn't even disagree with the point he is trying to make. The two come to blows because Hakuno believes that people like her and Twice shouldn't be the ones to decide humanities' fate because they are both ghosts, and the dead shouldn't get to decide the future of the living.

Regardless, Hakuno has a lot more depth despite first appearances giving her the impression of a self-insert, and these small details would go on to define her character in CCC, Extella, and Link, where her character gets expanded upon.

I could go on, but I think I've said enough already. Extra was very much a good start to the Extraverse, and with Record around the corner, I hope that many people who have been putting off getting into the Extraverse finally decide to make the jump. Extra, CCC, Extella, and Link all tell amazing stories that are very much worth experiencing.

Now, if only we could get CCC in the West, we would be able to experience all the Extraverse properly.