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am-i-interrupting · 1 month

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Affection | Vox x Fem!Reader

Summary: Vox and Valentino get into it. Vox looks for a way to get payback and stumbles upon you. He didn’t expect you to actually care.

Warnings: sex work, a bit of a mommy kink

He was used to the petty yelling, the constant spats, even the object throwing. What crossed the line was when he had to replace his screen.

Vox and Valentino got into a lot of arguments, normally started by the latter instead of the former. This one was bad though. Vox didn’t even want to think about it but it was all that was on his mind.

He was angry.

He was angry because it was easier to be angry rather than something else, something more vulnerable. He didn’t want to and couldn’t afford to be vulnerable right now. He had to hold onto this anger so he didn’t go crawling back to Valentino.

Currently, he was at his desk, looking through documents about ads that were just waiting for Vox’s stamp of approval. He stumbled upon yours and he paused.

He recognized you. Why?

He copied your name into a search bar and looked at your Sinstagram profile. Flipping through the pictures, he found one of you at a bar and that’s when he remembered.

Valentino tried to contract you and you’d basically laughed at him. You’d tossed back a shot and then turned to Valentino, asking if he needed you to pay for it since he was clearly so desperate for new recruits as he was only preying on people too stupidly drunk to realize how bad of an idea it was to say yes. Oh, he remembered Valentino seething that night.

He approved your ad but he couldn’t get you out of his head. He opened the closed tag again as he actually read through your ad.

You were advertising music. Which, when say side by side with your Sinstagram made sense as he saw a picture of you with Verosika Mayday. There wasn’t really anything interesting on the advert.

He scrolled up to the top of your Sinstagram in order to look at them in order from most to least relevant. That is when he caught sight of a link in your bio. He clicked it.

He was brought to a website. He wasn’t sure what he expected but he did raise an eyebrow nonetheless. It was an escort sight. A home page that had you and several other people scantily dressed with a description of what every person and the services you offered.

Maybe he was being more vindictive than he thought because he immediately clicked on the tab that sent him to your page and booked a time with you.

It was far out, months away in fact. He honestly had forgotten about it until he got an email the week before asking if he was still available and inviting him to a pre-session consultation. Not willing to back out and have it potentially mess with his image, he made the time.

He logged into a video call several days later and was greeted with you in the middle of putting on your makeup.

“Well, hello, Mr. Vox,” you said with a soft purr. He replied with a formal greeting of your name. “You’re a busy guy and I’m a busy gal so I’ll keep this quick. This is just a little meeting for boundaries. I know it bothers some people to make them in person so I’ve found this to be an easier way.

“I’ll go first. No hickies, no bruises, no scratches, no cuts, no burns, just no marks. It might be pretty and fun in the moment but it costs me later. Not everyone enjoys having sex with someone who’s clearly had it with someone else not long before. It may be part of my work but people do like an illusion.

“I don’t do bondage where I’m the one tied up. It’s nothing personal, just a safety issue. On the topic of safety, if you bring in anything that could be used as a weapon. I’m done and you’re leaving. All I need from you is that pretty little body of yours and payment. I’ll provide the rest.

“On the topic of payment, I know you’ve already made your upfront payments for this little consultation. The rest can be brought when you come in cash. Any questions so far?”

He surprised himself by saying, “Not so far, no.”

You we’re far more thorough than he thought. He’d bought time before but it was never this professionally done, even by Valentino’s standards. Granted, with Valentino’s sex workers, there was really only one rule, payment upfront. He didn’t give a fuck about anything else.

You though? You had clearly given this a lot of thought on all parts.

“Good, I’m glad,” you said. “Those are my hard rules. Everything else is a little more flexible. So, tell me, what is it you want from tonight?”

“To have a good time.”

“Of course, we all want to have a good time, Vox, but I’m talking specifics. Don’t be naive,” you said. “I have full confidence you know better. Maybe it’d be easier if I told you what I’m best at.”

The lid of your lipstick clicked closed. You looked at the camera, looking at him directly on his screen by proxy, for the first time.

“I can do just about anything your cold, dead heart desires but I enjoy specific things more than others. I’m a bit of a dominatrix, I’d you will. I enjoy the power and control of giving people what they need instead of what they want. How does that sound to you?”

“It sounds to me like a very overlord thing to do,” he replied.

“Not there yet,” you said. “So, is that the role you prefer to play?”

“It’s one I play often.”

“Yes, I’ve gathered that but do you prefer it?”

Vox didn’t know why he didn’t just say yes. He should have. It went with his image to say yes and that’s why he was still agreeing to do this even though he and Valentino weren’t on the worst of terms right now.

He hadn’t crawled back to Valentino yet. It’d been one of their longer spells away from one another. Five months without even falling back into bed once.

Perhaps that’s why he said what he said. He was pent up. He hadn’t had time to unwind and the person he normally would go to for that he was still upset with. That’s the reason he’d go with anyway.

“It’s the role I play most often,” he said.

“But is it the role you like?” you asked. When he didn’t answer you smiled, a more genuine one than any flirty or sarcastic one you’d shot his way before. “Stubborn, I’ll keep that noted.”

“I am not—“

“You’re proving my point. Now,” you stood up and rummaged through a drawer he couldn’t see, “pick a set for me.”

For the next several hours, Vox felt like he couldn’t focus. He was nervous. He couldn’t even remember the last time he’d been nervous over a one night stand.

He left early, leaving his assistant with double the workload but he didn’t care. He just needed to be out of the building.

He took Vark out on a walk to pass time but it still went by so slowly. It took what felt like days for it to finally be time to leave.

He’d call it considerate that he left without his usual suit jacket, waistcoat, and tie but in reality, he felt so hot, constricted with them on.

He traveled through the cameras and arrived at the address he’d been given, not a single person having seen him.

He knocked on the door and that sense of security was promptly shattered when it opened and he heard someone say, “Holy shit!” in response to seeing him.

He glared at the offending person as he stepped in. He recognized them from being pictured on your website. They quickly spun around and continued doing whatever it was they were in the process of.

He was led to a room which when opened revealed you inside. You were wearing a shear robe that gave him a peak at what was hiding underneath.

“I was promised secrecy,” he said. “Not to be gawked at by the employees.”

“So you don’t want to be gawked at me?” you asked. You smiled at your own joke. “Everyone here is under contracted lock and key to not say a single word about what goes on inside these walls. You’re image will be fine.”

“Contracted?”

“You said I had the makings of an overlord,” you replied. “Why are you suddenly surprised that I have contracts? Don’t worry, I assure you they’re much more ethically sourced than your co-worker’s.”

He rolled his eyes.

“Speaking of,” you said as you took several steps towards him, “why are you here? I’d imagine you could have any of Valentino’s contracted cash free. Why waste it on me? I’m not exactly cheap.”

You held out your hand and he reached into a pocket to retrieve the other part of your payment. You swiftly began counting it.

“You fuck one of Valentino’s pets, you’ve fucked them all,” he said. “They’re all too scared to be any fun after a while.”

“As much as I know that’s a true statement—“ you put the cash in a drawer of the bedside table— “I don’t believe it.”

He felt his eye twitch. “And what exactly would you—“

“Why don’t you take off your shirt and lay on the bed?” You walked towards him and ran your hands up his torso. “Or I could take it off for you.”

You began unbuttoning his shirt and for some reason, it made him drop all his irritation. When you finished, you bent down and licked all the way up his torso. You kissed and nipped at his collar bone.

His hands went to your sides but you spatted them away. The shirt fell to the ground.

You looked up at him, like you were daring him to kiss you. However, when he went to do just that, you stepped away.

“On the bed face down, mister,” you told him.

He huffed. Despite his mind telling him to grab you and pull you in for a kiss, take you and remind you of who exactly you were messing with, his body followed your instructions.

The mattress dipped as you straddled him. Something popped open (he tensed), a bottle clinked as it was set on the table, and then the sound of you rubbing your hands together went through the air.

Your hands, warm against his skin and slick with oil, began to rub up and down his back.

“Why are you here, Vox?” you asked. “I’m not stupid. I keep up with the news. Did you think I wouldn’t notice that the day you made an appointment was the same day you updated your status to single again? It’s still single now so what happened?”

“Nothing happened,” he said.

“Uh-huh, and the fact that you visibly tensed as soon as I mentioned Valentino is just a coincidence,” you said. “Everything you say in these walls stays within them.”

“You’re the one who made the contracts,” he said. “You’re not under them.”

“True, but—“

You began to apply pressure with your thumb, grinding your thumb and hand in circles along his back.

“Oh, fuck.”

“—I also made them,” you said, basically repeating his words. “It means I place value in confidentiality.”

“Or covering you’re own— oh, fuck, right there— your own ass.”

“I could be.”

You leaned down and he felt toy trap his entire torso beneath you. He liked the feeling. He liked the feeling of you over him.

You got close to his face, “But I think we both know I’m not.” You moved back and he mourned the feeling as soon as it was gone. “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to. You’re just very obviously tense and not just physically.”

You punctuated your sentence by rolling the palm of your hand at the base of his neck before squeezing it lightly. He couldn’t hold back a moan at the feeling of some tension leaving his body.

You continued on like that in silence for a while. You were working out the knots in his muscles and he was basically putty beneath your hands.

He’d never been treated like this before. He had couldn’t remember the last time he felt loose. There was always some kind of feeling of unease he constantly carried.

He didn’t even know he needed this because he’d never known that he could have it.

You leaned to once again lay over him but this time he could feel the entire weight of your body instead of just your warmth. You wrapped your arms underneath his shoulders and placed a kiss to his neck.

“Are you alright to continue?” you asked him as you nuzzled against his shoulder blade.

“I—“ He tried to search for some witty or snarky remark to make but all he could come up with was, “Yes.”

You cooed at him and slipped your hands out from underneath him to rub his back as you got off him. “Using your words, what a good boy,” you said and he hated, hated how that made him feel so warm inside. “Can you turn around for me? Yes, good.”

He closed his eyes and refused to look at you. You laughed but it didn’t feel mean. That didn’t make him feel any less embarrassed, however.

You did a wider, full handed version of the back massage you’d given him to his front as you began to roll your hips against his. He couldn’t hold back a whine.

“Oh, so pretty,” you said. “Such pretty noises from such a pretty boy.”

“Fuck,” it came out weak and pathetic.

Well, it was fitting then because that’s how he felt, weak and pathetic. Such simply praise shouldn’t be so effective.

“How does that feel?” you asked. “Come on, be a good boy. Tell me. Tell me how to make you feel good, baby.”

You were kissing on his neck and shoulders now.

“Good,” he choked out.

You hummed against his skin.

He could feel his fingers flex. His arms moved. He stopped them. He wanted to touch. He should be able to touch. He should be able to do what he wanted. He was the fucking Vox, overlord and creator of the biggest tech company in Hell. He shouldn’t need permission to do something.

You grabbed his hands and brought them up to the knot of your robe.

“You can touch me, baby,” you told him.

A whine forced its way out of his throat no matter how much he tried to keep it at bay.

He opened his eyes and you were so beautiful, grinding against him like you were made to. He could feel his cock straining against his pants. He wanted them off.

He settled for untying your robe. It fell to reveal the deep blue set he’d chosen for you earlier that day. It was sheer enough to show off your nipples through the cross crossed pattern of the bra. There was a silver chain that draped between the cups and further framed your breasts. Some traps went around your torso as part of the garter belt which held up your similarly colored stockings. You looked gorgeous.

You laughed and guided his hands up to your waist. Then up to your tits.

“I love the way you keeping whining for me,” you said. “You’re like a little pup.” Your eyes honed on his neck and your hand followed your gaze. You pressed on his neck, just enough to add some pressure. “That neck of yours looks like it was made to be collared and leashed.”

“Oh fuck.”

You leaned closer to his face. “Would you like that, baby?”

His fingers twitched around your breasts. He rubbed his thumbs over your clothes nipples as a silent apology. “Please.”

“Oh, such good manners.” You applied more pressure to his neck, not enough to cut off his air supply. He arched into your touch. “But not tonight. Some other time, I promise. I’ve got a feeling I’ll be seeing you plenty, baby.”

You went to nip at his neck. His hands wrapped around to your back to hold you in place. Your own traveled down his torso and to his belt.

You undid it. You pulled down his pants but not his underwear. You slipped from his grasp.

You put your hands on either side of his bulge and ran your fingers over it. His legs spread open further as he tried to push up but you quickly put an end to that little action.

Your hands on his hips, you hovered your head over him. You licked a stripe onto the fabric. You began to suck him off with the barrier of his boxers.

He knew he was whining. His eyes wanted to screw shut but he kept them open, too transfixed by the visage before him.

Your own eyes were closed. Your hands, perfectly constraining his boxers, were wrapped around his hips. The tips of your perfectly manicured hands were digging into his skin. Your tongue lulled out and lavished him.

He could cum from just this alone.

However, as soon as the thought came to him, you pulled away.

“No, no, no, please, please, let me come,” he said, words flowing from his mouth before he could stop them.

“Aw,” you said with a chuckle, “begging so soon? How sweet. Don’t worry, baby, you’ll get to come soon. I’ve just got to see that little dick of yours first.”

The small bit of degradation mixed with all the praise made him twitch.

He’d never gotten any negative comments on his dick before. Rather the opposite, Valentino had tried several times before to talk him into at least faceless camera work but he didn’t want to think of the moth right now.

You pulled his underwear down to reveal his cock. It was length, a deep blue like the rest of him except were it was flushed vibrantly at the tip. He was already leaking pre-come. Milky white against his flesh.

You leaned over to lick it up. His eyes rolled back at the simple action.

Your smirked before you took him all your mouth at once. You slowly pulled up and let your teeth pull at the hood of his tip.

“Shit, shit, shit!”

He thrusted up into what was now just air as he twitched, his whole body convulsing but he didn’t come. He was on the verge though.

You shushed him as you stroked his inner thigh with your nails.

“Be a good boy for me and hand me the lube,” you said before you began sucking on the skin above his pelvic bone.

His hand went to your hair as he closed his eyes and moaned. It took him a moment to open them again but you didn’t seem to mind. He didn’t feel rushed.

When was the last time he hadn’t felt rushed while having sex? He couldn’t even remember. It was always about getting back to work as soon as possible or Valentino’s quick hits. It was never really about him. It was about getting rid of his boner or Valentino’s as soon as possible.

He liked this. He liked this feeling of. . . being cared for?

God, he was so fucking pathetic. He could feel tears filling his eyes as he reached for the lube on the bedside table.

“Are you alright, baby?” you asked. “Do you need to stop.”

“Fuck, please don’t.”

“Okay, we don’t have to stop. We can keep on going,” you said as you poured some lube into your hands. “You just keep on being a good boy for me, alright? You can cry if you need to, baby. It’s okay to cry, you know.”

That permission made it worse. He felt his face flush as tears began to stream down his face. This was pathetic. He was pathetic. He shouldn’t be crying. He’d rarely ever cried. Much less during sex, especially sex that he was enjoying.

“Can you bend your— oh, such a good boy,” you said.

You hooked his bent knees over your legs and pulled him into your lap.

You wrapped your hands, covered in warm lube (when was the last time someone had took the time to warm up lube before touching him?), around his cock and began slowly twisting your hands up and down. He couldn’t stop the weak thrusts.

“I’m sorry,” he said, repeating the phrase like a prayer.

“Shhhh, baby, it’s okay,” you told him, petting his thigh. “You take what you need. You’ve been so good for me. So good. You deserve it.”

“Fuck.”

He threw his head back against the pillow and then looked down at you. He immediately met your eyes, so soft and understanding. It made his stomach queazy.

He watched as his dick slowly was covered then revealed by your hand. It curved around him so perfectly, glistening with a mixture of lube and the pre-come he was leaking. You twisted your hand in just the right way.

You covered his cock and then revealed the head. You thumb lingered and smeared the pre-come at his tip. The point of your nail ever so gently grazed his hole and that’s what did it.

The lights flickered in the room as he spasmed and came. His screen went blank as he blacked out.

A few seconds later, he came to with you by his side with a glass. You tilted his head up and cupped your hand under his lips as you forced him to drink, any water that spilled was dropped in your hand.

You grabbed a cloth and wipes at his screen.

“Are you okay, baby? Was that good?” you asked and he could only mutely nod. “Good.”

You went to pull him into an embrace but stopped and looked down at your body. “Do you wanna clean me up or do you want me to do it?”

He followed your gaze and saw his come covering your torso, a bit of it even clinging to your bra. He leaned to lick it off you. You reclined onto the thrown of pillows and let him, stroking his shoulders and arms as he did.

He licked up to your bra and then was met with the rough contrast of the lace-like fabric compared to your smooth skin. He reached around and undid the bra. You let it fall and he licked where the come had been. Then he began sucking on your breasts.

“Oh, fuck,” this time it was you.

Spurred on, he reached down between your thighs and began stroking. You were wet, so fucking wet. His fingers slid through your folds with no hint of resistance.

He rolled your clit between two knuckles.

“Oh, so good for mommy,” you said as you continued petting him. “So good.”

He whined at both the praise and the title you had given yourself.

He began stroking you with a different purpose now. He needed you to come. He looked up at you, still sucking on your tit. He needed to see it.

Your breath quickened. Your pets turned into a tight hold. It was your turn to whine as your head rolled back and your mouth lulled open.

“So good! So good for me, baby, just like that,” you said right before you became incoherent. You groaned and moved up into his touch.

He went back to the tower feeling better than he could ever remember. The set you’d worn tucked into his pant pocket. You insisted, saying you had plenty of other sets. Who was he to refuse?

“Where the fuck have you been?” Velvette asked.

“Out,” he said as he walked passed her, in no mood for her screeching.

“For over two hours with your location turned off? You didn’t even answer your fucking phone,” Valentino said, voice raising to nearly as yell towards the end.

“Yes,” Vox said as he continued walking.

He heard Valentino laugh as he must have seen the lingerie set in his back pocket. “Were you really so busy fucking a hole that you couldn’t answer me? I hope they were good.”

“Better than you ever were,” Vox said before he closed his bedroom door, unwilling to let his lax mood be ruined.

A few months later, Vox was still going to see you. Absolutely hooked and you both knew it but so were you. You didn’t even made him pay but he still slipped money into your pocket or your bra so he wouldn’t have to face the fact that he was getting attached.

That was all thrown out the window when you released a new song. He wasn’t even halfway through watching the music video before he disappeared and found you, pulling you in for a bruising kiss and you knew exactly why.

The imagery in the music video was obvious. Pink smoke trying to creep into your studio only to be blocked, a deep blue body, TV screens everywhere. Then there were the lyrics:

I can give my babe affection without any type of infliction

You were just an intermission but I’m the center of attention

I’ve got him collared and leashed right where he needs to be

He’s down on his knees begging me with please

Better than any of his fantasies

Yeah, I’ve got his attention without infliction

#for the song I’m thinking chrissy chlapecka vibes just FYI #hazbin vox x reader #vox x reader

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andreabandrea · 4 months

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The AndreaBandrea UTY post

I need some place to put my Undertale Yellow (UTY for short) thoughts & criticism, and this is my blog, so I might as well put them here. If you don't want to see constructive criticism about Undertale Yellow, don't click below the readmore!

Pretty much everyone I talk to really likes this game, and honestly, I'm really sad that I don't like it more. I like some parts of it quite a bit! But I have mixed feelings about other parts-- I think the writing and characterization could have been a little more impactful than they were, and I’ll be discussing that here. I don’t want to just rag on this game without expressing suggestions and parts that I do like in more detail, so those will be covered as well.

I also want to add a disclaimer that I don't have negative feelings towards the development team or fans of this game in the slightest. I have nothing but respect for the creators of Undertale Yellow. This project was obviously a massive undertaking with a lot of love behind it, and I'm glad to see that it's found success and a community of people who do enjoy it.

The reason I’m writing this post is that, again, I liked parts of this game and wish I enjoyed it more. If I didn’t like it at all, I just wouldn’t engage with it at all anymore. I also haven’t really seen any other people expressing constructive criticism on the game’s writing, so it’s felt more important for me to express these thoughts, be heard, and see if others feel the same way.

The Good

I'll start off with the things I like. The art, the animation, and the music are all fantastic. I was very impressed by the battle backgrounds and the little touches, like the way Clover runs. Clover doing things like reaching for other’s hands, giving fistbumps, drawing their weapon, changing their expression at times-- they feel very dynamic and fun to play as.

The music is really catchy and fun. I love the iterations on the battle theme-- Snowdin’s battle theme having bells, for example.

I also had fun with most of the fights in the game! I liked the unique mechanics that came into play (e.g. the lasso in North Star's battle). I think that changing the way Clover attacks compared to Frisk feels organic and fun.

I also love the mail system. Ever since you could deliver and receive letters in Paper Mario 64, I’ve been hooked on mail as a storytelling system in video games. I think the letters you receive are interesting and clever, and it’s a great way to keep past characters relevant in lieu of a cell phone.

I’m going to be discussing criticism of the characters later, so I’m going to take a moment to talk a little about things I liked about them. I really like Martlet’s optimism and belief in humans. Starlo made me laugh quite a few times and the Feisty Five have a great dynamic with each other. A lot of the background characters in the game are fun-- I like the one who serves you at the Honeydew Resort. The fact that you can go back to these vendors later on and get four new topics to talk about is fantastic and makes the world feel a lot more alive.

The Slightly Less-Good (and more disclaimers)

The writing is where the game falls short for me-- and it’s sad for me, because the writing is the heart of Undertale. I don’t think that the writing is bad by any means! I like the characters and story well enough, but- again- I just wish that I liked them more. I’ll try to incorporate suggestions so this isn’t just a total downer post without anything backing it up.

I want to express something about the ‘suggestions’ that I’ll be offering after the criticism. I know that Undertale Yellow is now out, and the team isn’t going to go back and change it now, and that’s totally fine. I don’t want to make it sound as if the team should change Undertale Yellow just because I have some reservations about it. I’m just one fan out of many. In the very off chance that a member of the Undertale Yellow development team is reading this--

First of all, hi!

Second of all, I know that changing major parts of Undertale Yellow at this point is very unrealistic, and I wouldn’t want you to. If anything, I’m honored you’re reading my ramblings at all. I’d be touched if you’d be willing to take some of my words to heart as you move onto your next creative projects.

The reason I’m including suggestions, therefore, isn’t because I think that the team should or must make these changes, but because I don’t want to just sound excessively negative about this game without offering a little feedback.

I don’t presume that my criticism and suggestions are objectively correct or better than what the Undertale Yellow team created. This is my personal blog, and these are my personal rambly thoughts about Undertale Yellow. The reason I’m including so many disclaimers is because I’ve gotten into discourse before due to poorly thought-out posts about Undertale, and I hope to avoid that this time. I don’t want to just not post something on my own blog, though, because I’m afraid it could be misconstrued or possibly upset somebody. So, I’m trying to discuss this as carefully as I can.

As one final disclaimer, I'll say that I know that it was more likely than not that I'd be at least a little disappointed by Undertale Yellow. The original Undertale was a very important game for me, and very little could reach that standard. (I think this is one reason why Toby decided to do Deltarune, a sort of AU/spinoff rather than a full-on "Undertale 2", and I respect that decision.)

I also think that quite a bit of my criticism is subjective-- several of the characters didn't fully click with me and several of the jokes just didn't land for me, personally. More people than you might think just didn’t connect with the regular Undertale, either. I’ll be talking a little about my subjective opinion on characters, but I’ll try to explain why I feel the way I do rather than just say, “XYZ character sucks because they’re lame, moving on.”

With that said, the post. I’ll be addressing my criticisms from smallest to largest. To begin, I’ll recap the plot of UTY to better analyze aspects that I do and don’t quite like. Spoilers abound.

Undertale Yellow Plot Recap!!!!

The central story of UTY, to my memory and understanding, is as follows:

In the past, a fallen human being went on a rampage in Snowdin and hurt Kanako, the daughter of Chujin, a former royal scientist and monster who happens to be a boss monster. Dalv, an unrelated monster, was also hurt in this incident and sealed himself away in the Ruins in a self-imposed isolation. Chujin’s family (presumably him or Kanako, but not Ceroba, as she doesn’t recognize Dalv) felt bad about this and left him corn from Starlo’s farm as a gift. But, when Chujin died, the corn gifts stopped coming.

Stepping back a bit, after the incident, Chujin developed a deep hatred for humanity. He invented a security robot called Axis and told it to go kill the human. Axis did this (and we will return to this later). Chujin kept the soul (at least, for a time) to experiment on.

At some point in this, Axis failed to impress Asgore and Chujin was fired as the royal scientist. At some point as well, he began to teach Martlet how to build puzzles. Martlet got a job in the royal guard and Chujin disapproved because humans are very dangerous.

Due to experimenting on his own boss monster soul in an attempt to find a way to turn regular monsters into boss monsters so that monsterkind could potentially stand up to the threat of humanity, Chujin wound up very ill and then passed away. He left video tapes to his wife, Ceroba, asking her to finish his research. However, he asked her to leave Kanako out of this so she could live a normal life.

Ceroba agreed to finish this research, but Kanako found out about it and asked to be experimented on because she, like her father, has the power of a boss monster. Ceroba agreed to experiment on her, which injured Kanako and caused her to ‘fall down’. Ceroba sent the near-death Kanako to Dr. Alphys, the new royal scientist, who was collecting ‘fallen down’ monsters for her own experiments with determination.

Plot summary over. I’ll take a closer look at some of these aspects going forward.

UTY Plot Criticism

I don’t feel like this is a bad story, necessarily. With that said, it doesn’t feel quite as tied together as Undertale’s story does, and I think certain aspects don’t land.

First, I feel that the majority of the plot elements about Chujin & Kanako get dumped on you at the last minute. You might be thinking that the story about Chara & Asriel is also dumped on you at the last minute-- and to an extent, this is true. You do get a massive amount of information regarding their story near the end of the game, in the True Lab.

However, Chara & Asriel's story is a massive part of the narrative from the very beginning. You meet 'Asriel' (Flowey) in the very beginning of the game. Toriel is in the Ruins due to the fallout of Chara & Asriel's deaths. Asgore and the monsters are trying to kill Frisk and steal their soul because of this, and the royal guard has taken it up as their mission. Sans is aware of an anomaly that will end everything (implied to be the player), and he would have 'killed Frisk where they stand' had he not made a promise to Toriel. And so on.

I’ll be reviewing criticism of the game’s plot in sections themed around each major character. I will be discussing suggestions about each character in their respective section here, as I discuss things I didn’t quite like about each character, my suggestions are intrinsically tied to why I didn’t quite like them.

Dalv

The connections between characters and the Chujin & Kanako plot feel a bit tenuous to me. Similarly to Toriel, Dalv is in a self-imposed isolation in the Ruins due to a major incident in his past. He fears humans due to the attack he suffered in Snowdin, and he suffers loneliness after losing his friend (who left him corn). When he sees Clover, he wonders if this is “some sort of haunting” (implying he knows that the human who attacked him was killed).

In the pacifist route, Clover can prove to Dalv that not all humans are evil and Dalv can move out and learn how to trust people again. This becomes a recurring theme-- Clover, pure of heart, proving to monsters that humanity isn’t that bad after all.

However, Dalv then disappears from the story. His motivation is to basically be left alone, but once you prove to him that humanity isn’t so bad, his role in the story is essentially complete.

I feel that, by comparison, Toriel’s motivation is more active-- to protect humans who fall down from Asgore. It’s this motivation that drives her to return at the end of the true pacifist route and ultimately make the true ending of Undertale possible.

Dalv’s passiveness makes him a weaker character to me. Now that you’ve proven that you’re his friend and humanity isn’t so bad, I would have liked to have seen him take an active motivation to protect his friend or help them in some way. We don’t have to copy Undertale beat for beat and have him dramatically save Clover from Asgore or anything, but it would have been nice to see him vouch for Clover in some way at some point.

Now, for the final time, I know that UTY is released and major changes aren’t likely. Some of my suggestions are “I would have liked to see this, but this change would require redoing the entire game,” which I don’t think should or could be done at this stage. This is just daydreaming and- if I’m praising myself highly- potential considerations for the devs’ future works (and the works of any other creatives who are reading this).

With this proposed major change to Dalv’s character out of the way, I’ll suggest instead the most minimal possible change that I would like to see, so my suggestions don’t feel entirely like just daydreaming.

I really like how Dalv sends Clover a letter about his moving out to Snowdin. This is active of him in terms of motivation-- Clover is his friend and he wants to keep in touch with his friend. I’d be absolutely thrilled to see a little bit of extra dialogue for him in an update. After you go back to Snowdin and see him, I think the dialogue he already has is totally fine! But, I’d be really happy if he’d take initiative and tell Clover a little more about his experience with the past human, or invite them to rely on him, too.

Martlet

Martlet felt… a bit restrained in terms of her writing, to me. I think that one aspect of Undertale’s writing is that it’s not afraid to go over the top. Papyrus isn’t just silly, he wears a costume every day and cartoon eyes pop out of his head when he’s surprised. Undyne isn’t just determined, she aspires to be a badass anime heroine. I like Martlet just fine, but she never had a moment where she really stood out to me in this way.

Martlet’s defining traits are that she likes puzzles, she loves reading and abiding by the rules of the royal guard, and she believes in humanity and wants to help Clover. As I said before, I really like this optimism and belief. I’d like to see more of it.

Near the end of the true pacifist route, Martlet says that she was taught in the royal guard that humans are scary, but Clover proved to her that humans are kind. This felt very abrupt to me at the time-- we know that Chujin disapproved of her joining the royal guard due to his own trauma, but Martlet had no personal involvement in the last human’s violent actions.

Martlet doesn’t seem to have any reason to dislike humans more than any other monster. We learn in her diary that she essentially joined the royal guard out of a desire to help people and build puzzles, and also because she needed a job.

If she’s just supposed to be a representative of the average monster and their feelings toward humanity, and her growing to like Clover is meant to represent how all of monsterkind could grow to like humankind, that would be one thing-- but I think that she specifically is meant to represent a person who wholeheartedly believes that humans can be good and that humans and monsters can live in harmony. In the no mercy route, she repeatedly pleads to Clover to do better, that they don’t have to act this way, that she wants to help them. That’s not the response of the average monster, who fights Clover or tries to flee from them.

I believe the intention is that Chujin & Martlet represent either end of an ideology axis (no pun intended). Chujin believes all humans are evil no matter what, but Martlet believes that humans can choose to be good. But why does she choose to believe in humans other than a sense of personal optimism?

I would have liked to have seen some defining event that made Martlet choose to believe in the goodness of humanity. I would have liked to have her being kind and optimistic to a fault be more of a defining trait-- to have that go over the top in an Undertale-style way. A lot of her interactions with other characters just personally weren’t very memorable to me.

Martlet spends a lot of the game sidelined. She loses you in the Mines. She gets thrown in jail in the Wild East. She has to go back to Snowdin once you're freed. Yes, she's there for you in the true pacifist route, but she's otherwise pretty absent through the neutral/true pacifist routes.

I recognize that the main characters in Undertale can be absent after you leave their respective sections of the game. However, you're able to call Papyrus & Undyne as much as you want, and you get a major hang-out (or “date”) with each of them and Alphys which gives time to expand on their backstory and character arc. Martlet doesn't get that. We even get a little bit of time to hang out with Dalv after we become his friend, but Martlet shoves us on a boat and hurries us to the next area as soon as we beat her. And sure, we get to talk to her on the boat, but it’s just a bit of silly dialogue-- it doesn’t really expand on her character. It feels like a missed opportunity.

So, yes, my major suggestion on her would be to zoom in more on her belief in you and let her be a liiiiitle sillier and more over the top, and give more opportunity for Clover to hang out with her.

At this stage, however? In this proposed minor ‘dialogue update’, I’d be really excited to see a little something more from her. Maybe a letter? She does send you one, but only in the neutral route to tell you to meet her on top of the apartments. It would be a good opportunity to either let her be silly or explain a bit about when she came to want to believe in humans-- or both, ideally.

Starlo

I honestly have very little to say on Starlo. He seems to be the fan favorite, and I did find his section fun! Ultimately, though, he's just kind of… there? I mean, he's on the periphery of Ceroba's (and Chujin and Kanako’s) story because he's her childhood friend (and his family grew the corn that Chujin gives to Dalv), and yes, he later on reminds her that she can still choose to be a better person because he also almost killed Clover! However, every monster in the game almost killed Clover.

There’s nothing wrong with having a silly character who wears a costume and isn’t a major player in the plot. I feel like Starlo is similar to Papyrus in this way. But Papyrus isn’t just a goofball, he’s the monster in Undertale who believes unerringly in Frisk & the player’s ability to do better because he firmly believes that you can make anything happen if you just try. This belief helps elevate Papyrus from comic relief to an actual rounded character.

I don’t feel like Starlo has any sort of strong conviction like that. We do learn that he wants to bring hope to the Underground by roleplaying as a sheriff in the Wild East town, giving them a slice of (supposed) surface life. I think this is fine, but I’d like to see a bit more of it. In the no mercy route, he does bravely stand against you because he’s a sheriff and it’s his job to bring justice to murderers like Clover.

My expectation when I first met him, a fellow cowboy (gender-neutral), was that he’d have his own ideas about justice. I expected that he would clash with Clover about these ideals, and neither of them would be quite right or wrong-- and this would prove that justice can’t be measured mathematically, and one outcome can’t be applied to all situations.

But, he’s not at all bad the way he is. He has a lot of fans, after all. The minor change I’d suggest now that the game is out is that I’d be interested in learning why the cowboy aesthetic specifically appealed to him. Maybe a diary in his room explaining that Westerns are the epitome of ‘justice’ to him? I’d like to see a peek into the motivation that transformed an ordinary farm boy into someone who could bravely stand against a murderous human.

Ceroba

I’ll be honest. I want to like Ceroba, but I don’t.

I understand that there's an attempt to mirror Asgore in that the war against humanity, in general, has taken Ceroba's partner and her child from her-- and ultimately, Clover forgives her and helps her learn how to move on. It's about letting go, just like Undertale. I get that. But Ceroba’s story doesn't land for me, personally. In order to talk about Ceroba, I need to talk about her husband, Chujin, because Ceroba spends so much of the story acting out Chujin's will.

Whereas monsters in Undertale do attempt to kill Frisk and steal their soul, and Asgore has killed other children before, it's framed in a very 'video game' violence sort of way (again, Undertale has these meta elements). Ultimately, in the True Pacifist route, none of Frisk's deaths have stuck, and Asgore's actions- while reprehensible- allowed for Asriel to break the barrier once and for all.

Chujin, in the video tapes he leaves for Ceroba, implies that Axis’s murder of the human- presumably a child, like Clover and Frisk- was very violent and bloody. It feels a tiny step beyond the 'video game violence' aspect, for me. While it’s shown that Chujin regrets this, it still doesn’t change the way that this violence is expressed in the game.

Instead of giving the human’s soul right to Asgore to bring monsterkind closer to freedom, Chujin- who has already been fired by Asgore, I should add- chooses to keep the soul and experiment with it.

This is very selfish, even though he has good intentions. He’s told nobody else about his experiments with his soul at this point- not even his wife- and Asgore has told him to cease all activities as the royal scientist.

While monsters do want Frisk's soul for their own selfish reasons, they notably do not butcher them violently, succeed in this, and still try to get painted with the same quirky and fun brush that the other characters get.

After Chujin dies, he leaves detailed instructions for his wife to continue his work-- and although he says "don't involve Kanako", he leaves her all the tools she would need to experiment on Kanako, and notably, no other way to finish his work except to experiment on Kanako.

As I said, Kanako finds out about this and asks to be experimented on. And while she does give consent, she is a child. I cannot stress this enough-- she is a child who just lost her father and is still wracked by grief. Kanako is a child who cannot possibly know what she is consenting to.

Ceroba chooses to experiment on Kanako and more or less kills her. And then she chooses to send her 'fallen down' daughter to Alphys's experiment, despite the fact that Kanako presumably has some sort of trace of human soul/determination left in her-- which could have compromised Alphys's work as well.

Let's return to how I said that Ceroba is a mirror for Asgore. She's made so many mistakes and it's cost her her family and she can't stop now or it will all be for nothing. She's done horrible things, just like Asgore.

But the difference is that Asgore is the king of monsterkind. Asgore has no desire to kill human beings. He declared war on humanity in a fit of anger and grief, but the Underground had lost hope due to the loss of Chara & Asriel. Believing that Asgore could gather seven human souls and free them all brought hope back to the Underground.

His actions, while wrong, are selfless-- and much less explicitly violent and more 'cartoon violence'-like. Chujin & Ceroba have the well-being of monsterkind as their own pure intentions, but their actions are far more selfish and violent. Axis, Chujin’s creation, massacred a human being. Yet we're still expected to find them silly and fun and relatable-- it just feels unusual.

I’m not someone who hates nuance or morally gray characters. One reason I’m so sad that I don’t quite like Ceroba is that I love morally gray women. It’s just that we’re not allowed to really dislike Chujin or Ceroba for what they’ve done, and instead we’re supposed to see Ceroba- and Axis- as silly and relatable like the rest of the characters.

Immediately after Ceroba’s boss battle, instead of processing what just happened to a greater extent, Clover chooses to sacrifice their soul for monsterkind.

I understand that the intention is that Ceroba's grief and Chujin's desperation to protect monsters from humanity contributed to Clover's decision to sacrifice their soul. However, the idea is- to me- abrupt. Ultimately, too, Clover's decision is just as much about how much they love their friends (and how it's impossible for them to hide out in the Underground forever) as it is about Ceroba and her family.

Chara & Asriel’s deaths, Asgore’s war on humanity, the war of humans and monsters-- these elements impact every part of Frisk’s journey. But Chujin and Ceroba’s actions, while impactful on Martlet and Dalv to varying extents, are only part of Clover’s journey. And Chujin and Ceroba did awful things for this comparatively minor impact on the plot.

EDIT: Further analysis about how Ceroba doesn't have a lot of agency and spends a lot of the plot just acting out Chujin's will, as well as the inconsistency in her characterization (and feelings about sacrificing Clover and the well-being of Kanako), with input from @carlyraejepsans. Thank you!

I would have liked to have seen a bit more from Ceroba without any influence from Chujin- maybe an interaction explaining her relationship with Martlet and an additional conversation about Martlet’s nearly unwavering belief in humans vs Ceroba’s inherited grudge against humanity- but I don’t know where this would fit in. Adding more time for Clover to process Ceroba’s boss fight before sacrificing their soul might throw off the pacing.

In general, though, Ceroba's boss fight- while flashy and fun- ultimately feels pointless with how little she learns from it and how quickly she changes her stance on using Clover's soul for the benefit of monsterkind, and what will happen to monsters after they break the barrier. To quote @carlyraejepsans in the ask linked above:

In addition, it's like the writing didn't want to commit to her delusions and little character development. She feels that her daughter is alive and thinks she can save her—wait no that was a lie—wait it wasn't. The moment she's defeated she goes "Agh, what was I thinking!" out loud (which is already a questionable writing choice imo but i digress), and recognizes that sacrificing Clover for her plans is horrible... and then 5 seconds later Clover chooses to sacrifice themself to break the barrier and whoops nevermind she's suddenly the one getting the others onboard with the idea... wait. didn't she say she was making the serum because the humans would've only slaughtered them again if they broke the barrier? oh wait wasn't that also chujin again? whoops.

I would have felt better if there were more room to view Chujin and Ceroba in a critical light (and time to view Ceroba outside of just being a mom and wife). I can’t think of any ‘minor’ suggestion that wouldn’t require a lot of editing.

Axis…

And... okay. Let's talk about Axis real quick.

I want to give the dev team the benefit of the doubt, but I need to point out that this security robot's name is "Axis 014." If you don't know what I mean by pointing this out, I'll just say that both of these terms are nazi dog whistles and allow you to look up the specifics.

I recognize that, by this point, it’s too late to change his name. I’d at least be grateful if the team would acknowledge this and confirm that they aren’t nazis.

Axis’s name makes his actions far worse in retrospect. He, as a security robot wants to kill a child, but he isn't able to anymore because his programming has changed. So, as a legal loophole, he forces them to hold 'a weapon' (a trash can lid) so he can justifiably kill them. This is the same robot that brutalized and murdered a human being in the past at Chujin's behest.

It feels tone deaf and ultimately the one thing I’d just outright call bad about UTY. I don’t think it was intentionally done this way, but I don't like that we're supposed to find this nazi-aesthetic police brutality robot "quirky and relatable" like the Undertale cast. In the true pacifist ending, he falls in love with a robot made out of a trash can and his eyes turn into cartoon hearts and etc. It’s even more jarring than viewing Chujin & Ceroba in a fun/relatable way.

In the no mercy route, Axis will defend himself and claim that his programming forced him to kill the human and he didn't want to. This "just following orders" defense feels weak to me as well, personally. Axis clearly delights in harming humans, going out of his way to try to kill Clover. But also, Axis spends a significant amount of the game displaying a very similar amount of free will to the other characters. He’s not just a janitor robot that sweeps back and forth.

He’s a nearly sentient being-- and the fact that there are these nearly sentient robots makes Alphys’s accomplishment of creating “a robot with a soul” (at least, so she claims-- Mettaton is only the ghost in a machine) much less impactful to me, personally. Yes, Asgore thinks that Chujin failed in creating a sentient robot, and so it’s impressive that Alphys supposedly did it. But I don’t know why Asgore wouldn’t be more skeptical of Alphys’s accomplishment after Chujin failed more than eight times and set fire to his flowers.

I think that Axis is ultimately a missed opportunity to make a really villainous character. This concept that he disobeys his programming- used as sort of a parallel for law, as a security robot- to attack Clover could have been explored to further the ‘justice’ theme. He doesn’t write his programming (the laws), he just carries it out (violently enforces the laws).

The ‘minor’ suggestion I’d make, though, is to just acknowledge the name.

Undertale & Meta Elements

Now, we’ll be addressing my largest criticisms-- the omission of meta elements and the way Flowey is written.

Undertale Yellow never quite stopped feeling like a fan game to me. And it is, of course-- but I think that it feels as if it tries so hard to be Undertale (in the writing style, the humor, etc) that it fails to forge an identity of its own, and that holds it back from being just a fangame to a fangame that succeeds in expanding on the original creative work.

At the same time, although UTY tries to feel like Undertale, I don’t think it captures certain elements that make Undertale be Undertale.

Whereas Undertale was ultimately about video games as a medium and the normalization of violence in them, UTY doesn’t have this level of metatextual commentary. UTY does have a running theme of 'justice'-- and I don’t think this is bad! After all, if Undertale already said all there was to say about video games and violence, why retread that path? I respect that UTY knows its limits and simply focuses on justice as a concept instead.

At the same time, Undertale isn’t just an RPG about mercy-- it’s an RPG about RPGs. The fact that you can talk to and spare enemies isn’t just a quirk of the game, it’s what the game is about. This is one thing that makes Undertale great that UTY doesn’t focus on.

UTY doesn’t completely ignore these elements, of course. Flowey takes over resetting for you, and you do have three distinct paths based on whether or not you kill enemies-- the ‘true pacifist’ path, the ‘neutral’ path, and the ‘no mercy’ path (I will not be calling it the ‘genocide’ route, especially in light of recent world events). Through whether or not you choose to kill enemies, the theme of ‘justice’ is explored-- who is Clover seeking justice for? In the true pacifist route, Clover seeks justice for the monsters, while in the no mercy route, Clover seeks justice for the fallen humans before them.

However, Flowey taking over the mechanics of saving and resetting for you makes concept of ‘the player’ obsolete. I recognize that not everyone in the Undertale/Deltarune fandom quite enjoys the concept of 'the player' and the meta elements of these games due to the fact that there can be implications that playing Deltarune (as an example, which ups the meta elements quite a bit) can actively hurt Kris and make their world a worse place. However, Deltarune isn’t a complete work and we don’t know this for certain. Additionally, I feel as if at least acknowledging Toby's intentions are important to analyzing the work, no matter what one's personal feelings are about them.

The Importance of the Player

The presence of you, the player, is important in Undertale. Frisk is a subversion of the 'blank slate protagonist' trope. You think that you're able to name them and control them, but in the True Pacifist route, Frisk begins to act on their own (they walk slowly in some parts of the True Lab because they're presumably afraid, etc). In the end, you realize that Frisk is their own person with their own name, and you as the player have to let go-- when Frisk & the monsters go to the surface, Flowey (a mirror of the player themselves) urges you to let them go. Don't treat this as a game anymore-- don't replay and wring out any last drops of content you can. You enjoyed it, now move on.

But many players want to see the No Mercy route because it’s the last thing they haven’t done in the game, and they don’t want to let go. And that's where the role of you, the player, becomes undeniable in the game's story. What is the No Mercy route except playing a 'typical' RPG in the way it's meant to be played? You grind to become stronger, killing every enemy that stands in your way. And when you've killed all the monsters and become as strong as you can be, you've won.

Many players didn't do this because they hate the characters in Undertale and want to hurt them-- if they hate them, they likely just wouldn't play the game. Many players did it because they like the characters in Undertale, and wanted to see what would happen. They couldn't stop playing. And this is exactly what Sans means in his dialogue during his boss battle-- to paraphrase, "you think that because you can, that means you have to."

This is one of the ways that Flowey is a mirror of the player. Flowey didn't start killing out of malicious intent, but because he had become so bored and isolated that he just "had to see what happens".

Chara's role at the very end of the No Mercy route is to call you out directly for this. They tell you that their power was yours. Their words were very misconstrued by fans for a long time, and they themselves wound up as a scapegoat for the No Mercy route-- but ultimately, there's no reason for Chara or Frisk to kill every monster in the Underground. The only reason is because of you, personally. You want to see what would happen. You want to grind and play it like a typical RPG.

They call you out for this if you don't want to delete the game world at the end. Why go back to that world that you've already destroyed? Why play nice with the monsters that you just massacred because you can?

Why am I talking about this at such length? Because I believe that ‘the player’ and how they interact with the world of Undertale is important. Characters lampshade the UI and battle mechanics often-- Flowey talking about the world as a game and ‘saving’ and ‘loading’, Papyrus telling you to “press C to open the dating HUD”, Sans explaining ‘LV’ and ‘EXP’, and so on.

This is my personal opinion, and I recognize this is very nitpicky, but I feel that not acknowledging this or adding to these meta elements in some way makes UTY weaker for me.

Flowey’s Role in UTY

Flowey essentially saves and resets for you because he's bored, and he wants to use Clover as a tool to access Asgore’s five stored human souls. His role as a mirror for the player becomes him essentially just acting as a stand-in for the player. While this in itself can invite self-reflection, I think that the execution of his role is a little awkward.

We learn at the end of the neutral route that Flowey has already reset the timeline hundreds of times by the time we first start playing the game. According to him, Clover always ends up at a dead end (they choose to stay in the Underground for the rest of their life) or they die (and they can’t reset of their own power). Thus, Flowey chose to set Clover on an alternate path by sabotaging a lever in the Ruins, which made them fall into the Dark Ruins and meet Dalv.

Flowey then tries to kill Clover and absorb their soul because they, again, hit a dead end. Yet he gives up on it after a while because Clover won’t stop fighting back, and he thinks he can just reset and try again anyway.

At the end of the true pacifist route, Clover instead opts to sacrifice their soul willingly to Asgore & monsterkind. Flowey comments that he could just reset (and you still can, if you want to play again), but Clover “earned their rest” and he calls them a friend.

This progression from “Clover is a tool that Flowey is using to access the 5 human souls” to “Clover is a friend and Flowey willingly lets them die and stay dead” feels undeserved and underdeveloped to me.

"But, Andrea," you might say, "Flowey went from trying to kill Frisk as Omega/Photoshop Flowey to hugging Frisk as Asriel really quickly too!"

Yes, but in that short time, Frisk and Flowey/Asriel had a Whole Thing where Frisk 'saved' him like everyone else and he learned he needs to let go, too. It was a short time, but it was a poignant time. By contrast, Flowey is pretty much absent throughout most of UTY's true pacifist route. Sure, you could easily say that he just got bored of Clover and gave up-- but that, too, doesn’t feel quite right to me.

I really hate to say this, but I feel that Flowey’s writing in UTY cheapens the original Undertale for me, which is why this is one of my major criticisms of the game.

Flowey's entire character arc in Undertale is about how he was stuck with the same places and same people for an endless amount of resets. In my opinion, the limited amount of places and characters for him to interact with in Undertale only adds to how trapped he is (and the Underground being so small really strengthens the concept of "there's overpopulation and the monsters are running out of time to find a solution/earn their freedom" that we see in the game, but I digress).

So when something finally changes and he meets Frisk, it's deeply impactful to him. Finally, someone new to play with! Finally, potential for change! Even though Flowey admits that, even if Chara came back, there's a great chance that he couldn't really love them due to his lack of soul, just experiencing something new for the first time in ages is as close to love as he can possibly get. So Flowey:

Starts to believe that Frisk is Chara, this person he ‘loves’ or wants to love, or some manifestation of Chara.

Refuses to let Frisk go, even if that means- when Asriel has the power of seven human souls- just resetting the Undertale timeline over and over instead of going to the surface or doing anything else.

For Flowey to have gone through everything that he does in UTY- all these new places, all these new people, Clover included- weakens this, in my opinion. And sure, there's very heavily implied to be lots of places that Frisk doesn't explore and people they don't meet-- 99% of New Home and its residents, for instance. But Clover themselves is the real problem for me.

No matter how many times Flowey reset with Clover, I really struggle to believe that he would get bored of a human being that easily. He even said that Clover's actions and choices would sometimes change from reset to reset, and he only recently learned how dramatically he could alter their path by sabotaging that lever in the Ruins. Clover isn't a static being-- and even if they were, they're at least a new static being.

And although we learn in the neutral route that Flowey can't really absorb Clover's soul because they fight back too much, I can't believe that would stop Flowey so easily. What about at the end of the pacifist route, where Clover has given it up willingly and it's being transported in a little jar? Clover’s body is separated from the soul, now-- could Clover still fight back?

Or, what about if Flowey tried to kill them as soon as they entered the Ruins? Or, what if Flowey played nice the entire route and then at the end tried to convince Clover that if they sacrificed their soul, he would take it to Asgore for them? With access to full control of the timeline, I don't think Flowey would give up on this. We learn in Undertale how painful it is for him to be soulless and how desperate he is to access power so that things will change.

For Flowey to acknowledge Clover as a 'friend'- maybe even a true person, not just a compilation of dialogue- suggests character growth. It suggests remorse for his resets that he isn't capable of having and doesn't have until the events of Undertale. I just don't feel like it’s earned.

Flowey is, of course, an unreliable narrator.

At the end of the no mercy route of UTY, Flowey expresses that he never saw Clover as a friend-- he only enjoyed watching them die over and over again. It should be noted that this was said while under extreme duress (Clover is LV 20 by this point and has killed everyone save for Asgore), and this route isn’t canon in the way that the neutral and pacifist routes are.

With that said, if we agree that Flowey can’t feel love as a soulless being, then I could argue that this is about as much of a ‘friend’ as anyone could be. This is how he wanted to keep Frisk (“Chara”, in his mind) for eternity when he had the six human souls + the entirety of monsterkinds’ souls-- just watch them try over and over again, for eternity.

Why am I contradicting myself? Because, let’s suppose that Flowey doesn’t mean Clover is a ‘friend’ in the traditional sense- that they earned his respect and he cares for them in some way- but Clover is a new toy that he got bored with and gave up on. I feel like this, too, makes Undertale a little weaker.

If Flowey did have some type of positive regard for Clover, but was willing to let them go, then it feels- to me- like Frisk’s role in his story isn’t that significant. Frisk helped him learn how to let go and move on, but Flowey has already demonstrated being capable of this. The circumstances are different- if Flowey gives up at the end of Undertale’s true pacifist route, it’s over for real, whereas if he gives up at the end of UTY, he can just wait for another human to fall- but I feel like the core feeling is the same. Flowey, by the start of Undertale, doesn’t strike me as someone who’s capable of letting go.

So, how would I have changed this?

I recognize that- again- Undertale already made these points about video games and violence, and Flowey has his entire character arc in that game. For Flowey to have more of an arc in this game would potentially make this game no longer line up with canon Undertale or weaken Undertale further. And why retread old ground that Undertale already talked about?

I respect the decision to tell a self-contained story, but the meta commentary about video games in Undertale is so significant for me that I personally would have liked to see a bit more of it in Undertale Yellow. I also recognize how much of my criticism of Flowey’s writing in UTY is subjective. It feels unrealistic for me, his arc feels abrupt for me, it makes Undertale less poignant for me.

A lot of people love his inclusion in this game, and it’s very novel to see Flowey as a friend throughout most of UTY and hear his snarky commentary on demand rather than having him as an enemy who’s absent through most of the game, as he is in Undertale.

The Flowey Suggestions

First, I’ll be honest. I know this is not and has never been possible, but my easiest solution to the dilemma of Flowey’s lack of a character arc- and the lack of an ability to give him a character arc- would have been to just remove him from UTY.

I think that Flowey’s inclusion in the story of the yellow soul human and his role saving and loading could have been interesting. It goes against certain story elements implied in Undertale, and popular fan theories-- and I don’t mind that, if something meaningful is done with it. But, I feel as if Flowey’s relationship to Clover isn’t impactful enough to justify including him.

To clarify on ‘implied story elements’ and ‘popular fan theories’:

While I might be misremembering, I thought that it was implied in Undertale that Flowey came into being after Asgore had already collected six human souls, and that a significant amount of time had passed since the last human had fallen down.

I won’t go into it at length because this post is long enough and I, again, am not an Undertale expert. With that said, it’s also implied that all human souls are capable of saving/loading/resetting in the Underground. If you make Frisk tell Asgore that he killed them before, he just nods as if he’s used to it-- and he’s the one character who we know has killed humans before.

Now, how did Asgore successfully kill beings that can just reset the game whenever they die? Well, Sans faces the same dilemma in Undertale’s no mercy route. There’s no way that he can permanently defeat you, the player, who is a real being. Therefore, the way he ‘wins’ is by infuriating you enough with his difficult boss fight until you give up and stop playing Undertale (or, at least, reset and make better choices).

Think about all the times you’ve played a game, got stuck on a hard boss, and never played it again. While it’s not ‘canon’ to the story- giving up on your copy of Mario doesn’t mean Bowser really wins- functionally, giving up on a game means that the story ends for you. This is how I believe Asgore captured the six human souls, even if they were also capable of resetting like Frisk is-- he fought them until they gave up.

Humans all are said to have great amounts of ‘determination’, not just red soul bearers. We don’t even know what trait the red soul exemplifies. Whatever it is, I don’t think it’s determination itself.

The bottom line is that I don’t think it would be unrealistic for Clover to be able to save/load/reset on their own, or for Flowey to not exist yet during the time they fell down.

But, I get it, Flowey was in UTY’s demo that has been out for seven years. He’s in the trailers. He couldn’t be removed at any part of development, and he sure as hell can’t be removed now.

My second suggestion would have been to zoom in on him, instead. While the prequel is about Clover, the yellow soul human, I would have liked to see it be about Flowey in a significant way. I kept hoping for Clover to have an opportunity to ask Flowey at some point, “why are you helping me, anyway?”.

This is my personal interpretation, but I’ve come to believe that Flowey thinks that the reason he’s stuck as a flower is that it’s a punishment. Because he, as Asriel, refused to fight back, he failed Chara, and now they’re dead. Now he’s stuck as a rinky-dink flower with no soul, he can’t love his former family, and he can’t stop playing this game.

In the no mercy route of Undertale, Flowey feels very much like he’s trying to appeal to Frisk- the person he believes is Chara- in a way like a younger sibling trying to impress an older sibling. He says he’s impressed by how you killed everyone. He helps solves puzzles so you won’t have to slow down. He brags to you about how he’s also a heartless killer.

Notably, he talks about his past. He tells ‘Chara’ that he was afraid to start killing, at first. He said he wouldn’t enjoy it, but he just had to know what would happen.

Then, Flowey laughs and says that you (Chara) know how liberating it is to be this way-- to kill people and shape their fates. He ‘recognizes’ Frisk as being actually Chara because of how they killed everyone in the Ruins.

But we have no indication that Chara was a violent or evil person in their life. I believe that Flowey is partially projecting and partially recognizes Chara because, in the last moments of their life, they were telling him to kill. He always knew that Chara hated humanity and wanted power to better the position of monsterkind. This is why Flowey brags about how he has a plan to get the human souls, and once they do so, they can go to the surface and “finish what [they] started.”

To Flowey, in my opinion, killing people isn’t just about seeing what happens. It’s about trying to understand and appease Chara and doing what he thinks he should have done all that time ago, as Asriel.

I bring this up because I think that I would have liked to have seen this be explored in Undertale Yellow. Flowey is still a very misunderstood character today due to being an unreliable narrator. I believe that a lot of Flowey misinterpretations are due to taking him at face value-- hearing him say that he’s an unfeeling, manipulative, patient killer and agreeing with him.

But Flowey contradicts himself at several points. He gives up his “catch these friendliness pellets” trick after you dodging just a few times. These aren’t the makings of a perfect manipulative killer, but an impatient child. That’s who Flowey is at his core-- a child.

I recognize that, again, if Flowey told all of his tragic backstory to Clover and they became true friends, this wouldn’t fit with canon Undertale and his actions in that game. Flowey and Asriel distance themselves from each other, and it wouldn’t make sense for Flowey to tell this to Clover-- especially if he just views them as a tool to use and play with.

I think, however, it wouldn’t have been impossible for Clover to have learned this information about Flowey in a way that could still be canon compliant with Undertale itself. Hypothetically, maybe the “hopes and dreams” statue in the UG Apartments near the Core could have sparked intrigue in Flowey.

Maybe analysis of Flowey could have come up during his neutral route boss fight-- after all, Clover appears to peek into the minds of Ceroba and Martlet during the true pacifist and no mercy run boss fights, respectively. We already get a little of this- Clover has to run through a hallway of flowers in Flowey’s boss fight, and we hear sad and scared dialogue that’s presumably from a past version of Flowey himself. However, it’s not necessarily new and doesn’t quite add to Flowey’s character in my personal opinion.

I feel that including Flowey’s story more in some way would justify having Flowey in the game, and knowing the history of Asriel & Chara could factor into Clover’s decision to give up their soul for the sake of monsterkind. Chara, too, sacrificed themselves willingly, after all.

I don’t have a ‘realistic suggestion’ that could be implemented with a dialogue update because these suggestions are so vast-- and, ultimately, very personal and subjective. I have very strong feelings about Flowey.

Meta Elements of Undertale

In Undertale, you’re asked when you should or shouldn’t fight. As a pacifist, you can get through the Ruins without killing anyone. Flowey will then ask you what you would do if you met a relentless killer. Would you betray your morals and fight? Or would you give up and let yourself die?

Undertale is the friendly RPG where nobody has to die. While you have to kill Asgore at least once to do the neutral route, and you do have to fight back against Omega/Photoshop Flowey to end his battle, the game ultimately posits that there never is a good time to fight. You don’t beat Omega Flowey by being stronger than him, you do it by appealing to the souls and allowing them to rebel. You don’t beat God of Hyperdeath Asriel Dreemurr by beating him up, you do it by saving your friends- him included. The game, again, is about an inversion of the necessity of violence in video games to me.

I would have been interested in seeing an exploration of when it is necessary to fight, and this could be done through the lens of ‘justice’. Would Clover fight if it brought them closer to justice (on a pacifist route)? Is it morally correct to kill one person if it saves thousands?

Sparing someone is always the correct option in Undertale. In that way, the true route is quite linear-- there’s one solution that works for everyone. What if there were situations in UTY in which there is no single correct option that works for everyone? What if Clover were placed in situations in which they had to act as arbiter and decide between two outcomes and what is right? It could have been like how they get forced to solve the trolley problem in the Wild East, but with consequences.

Adding to putting a ‘twist’ on the elements that Undertale introduces with its combat system-- what if sparing someone ultimately enabled them to keep hurting others? What if fighting to weaken someone was the correct solution for once? These inversions could have built on the meta elements of Undertale, and I think that it would make Clover’s decision to sacrifice themselves to bring justice to monsterkind more poignant to me.

Again, I have no ‘realistic’ suggestion for this in the full release of UTY. I think that the plot about justice alone isn’t bad, but I would have been happy to see it tie into the gameplay a little more.

Conclusion

Ultimately, I think that UTY tries too hard to be Undertale without iterating on the aspects that made Undertale memorable. The characters feel like they fail to pop or relate to the game’s story in meaningful ways, and to me, the main story isn’t executed as well as it could have been (and far darker than the main Undertale in ways that don’t feel as if they’re handled sensitively).

I will say, again, that this project is very impressive in scope, and I applaud the dev team for finishing it and releasing it. I recognize that a lot of my distaste is subjective, and creating another Undertale is a fool's errand considering the acclaim that Undertale got. I recognize one final time that my suggestions are just daydreaming, and this game has already found a lot of success-- which I think it deserves.

I tend to criticize a lot of media I like, which might sound contradictory to some, but it makes perfect sense to me. If I don’t like something, I won’t engage with it. I think that the original Undertale has its flaws, too. At the end of the day, I like UTY, but no media is perfect. This is how I think it could have been better, and I hope that I think other creatives who want to make Undertale fanworks (or any creative works, for that matter) will take these thoughts into consideration.

Thanks for reading.

#bandrea blabbers #long post #the uty post

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blazehedgehog · 1 month

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I WILL CHOKE ON THESE SOUR GRAPES TIL I'M IN MY GRAVE

youtube

I left this open in another tab, meaning to watch it like a week ago. It's an official video published and promoted on the Youtube Studio dashboard, about common misconceptions around their recommendation algorithm and what the truths really are. .

And now, finally watching it, that white haired dude, Mr. "Youtube Liason", is the guy who told me the algorithm ignored one of my videos because "maybe it just wasn't very good."

Famously, and something I will never ever shut up about when given the chance to mention it, I put out a video about Jurassic Park games just before Christmas, expecting it to slot in and do decent numbers, just like all of my other videos do. Since Youtube earnings tend to spike around the holidays, this was going to be how I paid for Christmas presents that year. It was something I'd done at least twice before. Instead, the algorithm completely ignored the video because it was outside my usual wheelhouse of Sonic content.

This is shockingly relevant to the very first topic they cover: whether a single "off-topic" video actually matters with regards to how the algorithm sees your channel, and the general answer from the Youtube technician is "No." You don't gotta tell me.

When I put my full weight behind a video, it easily breaks 10k views, even 50k or 200k+ views. Some of my most popular videos have cracked the multi-millions!

So when this dude spells out in plain english that the algorithm effectively ignores one-off videos? Yeah, no shit. I'm living proof of that. Across the first two years, that Jurassic Park video struggled to break even 2000 views. Only by paying out of my own pocket for multiple promotional campaigns and constantly complaining about its lack of performance has it struggled to hit just over 5000 views, some four years later. The algorithm knew it was way outside my regular wheelhouse and treated it like poison.

And this liason clown had the balls to tell me "well maybe the video was just bad, sorry bud" only to, two years later, sit down with this technician that spells out exactly what I was knew was happening and was trying to explain to him.

Except now, of course, it's being spun as a positive: "don't worry, a one-off won't hurt your regular content" as opposed to the "we didn't notify anyone about your one-off and it became stillborn" I experienced.

youtube

I have sat down and thought very intently about this Jurassic Park video. Obviously, if I make a stink about its performance, tell people the algorithm made a poor judgment call, I'm going to get patted on the back and comforted that yes, the video is good. Don't worry. The mean old algorithm is just dumb. Right? And Youtube unflinchingly believes in the power of their algorithm as this perfect shining golden standard to drive viewership, the thing that can never, ever be wrong about guys like me.

I appreciate the comfort and support of friends and colleagues and even random strangers who are inherently distrustful of the algorithm. But I also know that feels like an echo chamber.

So then what, do I trust Youtube? Absolutely not. At the end of the day their algorithm still made an unfair judgment call and despite their claims above that any old video can get picked up by the algorithm at any time, my video has never recovered. I've tried more interesting thumbnails, I've spent almost $100 on Google Adsense promotion -- one of which, I should note, was the same week that Jurassic World 3 released, and the other being E3. Both should have been extremely lucrative times to run ads. And I got crickets.

I like the video. I stand by the fact I think I did a good job on it. I remain proud of it. It's as good as any real-effort-content I've put out in the last five years. The echo chamber tells me it's a good video, too, even if I literally can't buy views.

So my only recourse is to sit here and stew in my bitterness towards this algorithm. The shining, ultimate example as to why you should never let a computer make a qualitative judgment call. And I will be frustrated and angry about this until I draw my last breath.

#youtube #google #algorithm #jurassic park #jurassic world #sour grapes

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its-rat-time-babey · 10 months

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Figuring out when the fuck Glitch Techs takes place.

Spoiler Alert: Not when you’d think.

Also probably spoilers for Glitch Techs idk.

Alright. Glitch Techs. I watched it, I liked it, I mourned that it was shelved by Netflix and will never get a season 3 or a conclusion to the story it was in the process of setting up, and I thought to myself:

“Hey, when does this show actually take place?”

Because we see technology from the past, present and future all in one timeframe being presented like it’s perfectly normal.

For the present (or at least 2019-2020, when the show was made), we see modern smartphones and VR gaming is a regular thing.

(Although do keep in mind that Smartphones seem to look more like the older models of Smartphone compared to our modern 2020 ones. This will be important later)

But that’s where the first flaws start showing up.

Starting with the evidence for the past: There’s fast, modern internet and social media exists, which is a point for modern day, but social media doesn’t seem to be a completely universal thing, with only a few characters we see actually using it.

Streaming and Streamers exist, with Mitch being a former streamer and member of a streaming group, but given how little social media is relevant in the show it’s actually arguable how popular or widespread streaming is.

People definitely know about Mitch Williams and the Furious Four, but I’d argue that those people are limited to more hardcore gamers and Hinobi game enthusiasts and not many (or even any) people outside that niche really know or care.

Mitch’s career as a streamer and any fame he has in general is only really noticed by other hardcore gamers like Five, other Glitch Techs and that one kid in the Hinobi tournament (the fact that they’re in the tournament to begin with means that they’re one of the best gamers Hinobi could find) after all. Miko, a hardcore gamer, doesn’t even know Mitch had a streaming career at all until someone else tells her (although she does kinda get a pass because it’s implied that Miko is homeschooled and just doesn’t know much about social media or streaming in general).

So it appears that in the setting of Glitch Techs, social media and streaming exists, but is a rather niche concept, with only a few demographics of people being interested in that sort of thing. High schoolers and older teens for social media, and hardcore gamers and game enthusiasts for streaming. So in that regard it’s a lot like the early 2000s when that kind of thing was just taking off and wasn’t as popular.

There’s also the far more obvious fact that arcades are common and very popular. Not something that you would expect if this show happens in the modern day.

Even TVs don’t line up with the present day. If you see a TV in glitch techs, it looks more like a TV from the 2010s than the modern day.

Note the stand and the fact that they’re not wall mounted and too thick to be proper modern TVs.

But on the topic of TVs and video games, this is where our one piece of big future evidence exists, so I’m going to disprove it real quick to make things easier for us.

There is holographic technology easily available and commonplace in gaming equipment.

And this isn’t just a regular case of Hinobi having advanced, futuristic technology that it only gives to its Glitch Techs (which I’m fully willing to overlook) because these holographic screens aren’t limited to just Glitch Techs. It’s an ordinary part of Hinobi’s commercial technology.

However, It can just be counted as Hinobi being really shady and advanced in terms of technology, especially since it’s only Hinobi technology that has this stuff. Phones, TVs and etc don’t have holographic screens, and there’s a canonical reason for that in the form of plixels, the Hinobi technology that creates all those glitches in the first place.

Plixels are canonically a thing that Hinobi invented to store massive amounts of data in very small spaces, which they use to make their products as advanced and high quality as possible. They’re also somewhat unstable which is what creates glitches, but that’s a whole different topic.

Point is. Plixels are extremely advanced Hinobi technology used in all of their products, and as seen in the show, can be used to create solid objects if used correctly. The holographic screens are just Hinobi Plixels being used for their intended purpose and it makes perfect sense why Hinobi has this technology, and as such doesn’t really provide any evidence of Glitch Techs happening in the future. Hinobi is strange, shady and has very advanced technology for it’s time, so we’re going to ignore most of the super advanced technology they have.

We will not however, ignore their older technology, especially the tech that parallels our own. That stuff is very useful.

Part 2: Actually solving this thing:

Here’s what we have so far for Glitch Tech’s setting:

VR gaming is a perfectly normal thing that matches or even somewhat surpasses modern VR (2020)

Smartphones exist, but visually resemble older smartphones from the early to mid 2010s

TVs resemble early 2010s TVs

The state of Social Media and Streaming seems similar to how it was in the 2000s

Arcades exist and are very popular, which dates things to anywhere from the 1970s to 1990s

Hinobi’s advanced technology fuckery can complicate things, and provides no evidence for any one time

For actually solving this, we need concrete data and that needs some assumptions regarding our world and how it relates to the world of Glitch Techs.

Because we have about three and a half pieces of hard evidence for the time period that Glitch Tech takes place in, and they don’t give completely conclusive dates, just a time frame of a few years that Glitch Techs can happen in and some explanations and rationalizations are needed to explain things that don’t line up.

It also uses the ages of some characters that I got from the wiki (which may not be completely reliable) and some educated guessing.

Those pieces of evidence are:

Ping’s creation and Emilio Nieves

Spec Ops

Phil’s files, Bitt and Bolybius

One crucial part of figuring out the Glitch Techs timeline is the fact that Video Games as a concept were created rather recently compared to our world. Five’s dad, Emilio Nieves was a former employee of Hinobi and was the creator of the first three video games, including this world’s equivalent of Pong, is still alive and according to the wiki is somewhere in his 40s.

Now we just need to figure out how old he was when he made Ping, and we have some pictures that might help.

In the episode “Ping”, we see Emilio Nieves at three different points in his life.

A young man who appears to be either in or fresh out of college judging by the other people around him that resemble college students.

An older man (that looks the same as before) raising Five that i estimate to be around his 30s considering his current age, Five’s age in the photo and Five’s current age.

Emilio Nieves in his 40s in prison, how he currently is.

Emilio Nieves is somewhere in his 40s, and judging by the pictures and how he was responsible for the first three games, probably made ping fresh out of college, and then made the other two a few years later.

Ping’s real life equivalent, Pong, was made in the year 1972, and if we assume that Ping and Pong share a birth year and Ping really was created when Emilio Nieves was in or fresh out of college, that would put the current year of Glitch Techs in anywhere from 1992 to around 1998, depending on exactly when Ping was made in relation to Emilio Nieves’ time in college (the average college student spends about 4-5 years in college, plus 1 year for time after leaving college).

That’s a pretty big timeframe, but it can be reduced by quite a bit with the help of another equivalent game.

Spec Ops.

Spec Ops is a game made by Hinobi that was freshly released when Five bought it in “Karate Trainer”. It’s also a very obvious parody of Metal Gear, so if we can figure out exactly what game in the Metal Gear franchise it’s closest to, we can compare its release date to the show.

And I narrowed it down to two games in the franchise. The original Metal Gear from 1998 and Metal Gear 2: Sons Of Liberty from 2001.

I apologize for the terrible pictures of the Metal Gear Games, I just couldn’t find any good ones.

I can’t figure out exactly which of the two games are closest to what we see in the show and I don’t really believe it’s possible, but this narrows our timeframe to 1998-2001.

Next up: Phil and his secret files.

According to Bitt, Phil has been working as the manager of Hinobi’s Bailley division for 20 years, and it’s implied that he worked as a Glitch Tech for several years before becoming a manager and being given Bitt. According to the wiki, Phil is somewhere in his 40s.

Now, we see Phil in his 20s in “BITT Prime” courtesy of Bitt’s photo album and we see a much younger version of him in Phil’s hidden files at the end of the episode.

However, you’ll probably notice that these two Phils are not the same. Notice the small beard on File Phil that’s absent on 20-Years-Ago Phil.

But we do still know roughly when this Phil existed because we have a photo close to that.

I’m not joking here. This is 100% serious. Notice the beard. This is the first appearance of said beard in all of Phil’s photos. Hippie Phil does have the beginnings of a moustache that File Phil lacks, but that still helps figure out when File Phil happens because it dates him to just before the photo was taken, in between Hippie Phil and the photo before it.

Hippie Phil is the 3rd picture in that photo album and assuming that each photo was taken one year apart, that means Hippie Phil happened 17 years ago, and File Phil Happened somewhere between 17 and 18 years ago, which I will simply round down to 17.

Hippies were a thing mostly in the 60s and early 70s, so if we assume that the photo was taken in the early 70s, that would place us around 1987-ish. But there’s a massive problem here: Ping puts us around 1992-1998 and Spec Ops somewhat narrows it down to 1998-2001, but now we have evidence pointing to way earlier than even the oldest possible date of 1992.

Luckily, although HIPPIES were a thing in the 60s and 70s, TIE-DYE specifically was a thing that went in and out of fashion during the 70s, 80s, 90s and even the 2000s. Phil isn’t being a Hippie in that photo, he’s just wearing tie dye, which happened to be in-style when the photo was taken, and I can’t explain the peace signs and stoned expression. Maybe some things are best left unanswered.

But this gives us another problem. Now the timeframe is too wide, spanning nearly 40 years of time. But this too can be solved using a completely different theory involving a certain arcade game that I have a love-hate relationship with:

Polybius. More specifically it’s in-universe equivalent Bolypius.

Almost nothing is known about Bolypius other than a few hints we’re given sparsely throughout the show, including:

Bolypius is a glitch of some kind that’s incredibly dangerous and important, possibly being intelligent and able to act human

Hinobi has no idea where Bolypius currently is

Miko may be important in locating Bolypius’s current location, for reasons that are unknown but probably linked to her reset immunity

If the show hadn’t been canned by Netflix, we would have had an episode dedicated to Bolypius, named “Bolypius”

An animatic from an unreleased episode exists bringing up “Bolypius Chess” as a very old game in the Glitch Techs universe

Bolypius presumably takes many details from its real urban legend equivalent

Now taking that last fact into consideration, here’s some important, basic details about Polybius:

Polybius was made by the government and caused all sorts of physiological effects on the people that played it

Mysterious men in black would often be seen messing with the machine and taking strange data from it

One day, Polybius just vanished. Taken away by the government never to be seen again.

Taking that into consideration and assuming that Polybius and Bolypius share similarities with each other (which they most likely do), you can assume some things about Bolypius, mainly that it was most likely purposefully created by Hinobi (who take up the role of the government here because it’s Hinobi, of course they do) for whatever reason and like Polybius, just vanished one day, with the difference that Polybius was taken away BY the government and Bolypius escaped FROM the government (or Hinobi in this case).

How does this apply to Phil’s messages to his future self? Well we’ll never know what those messages involve because Netflix is a bitch but judging by Past Phil’s comments about Hinobi wiping the minds of employees, the warning he delivers about “things getting glitchy” in the future and the slow reveal of Bolypius that was supposed to happen if the show didn’t get canned, it’s pretty safe to assume that these messages involve Bolypius in some way.

We also know that this information isn’t a clue to Bolypius’s location because for one, Phil’s mind was wiped at some point after making these videos, and if Hinobi is trying to FIND Bolypius they probably wouldn’t erase the mind of someone who has a clue to their location.

No, the video is definitely talking about Bolypius, but I don’t think it’s about its location or where it went. Past Phil mentions that he took a bunch of files from Hinobi’s development lab, aka the part of Hinobi responsible for making new technology and games, so I think these files aren’t about Bolypius’ location, but rather Bolypius’ CREATION.

Like it’s real equivalent, Bolypius was made by the government (or in this case, the equally shady Hinobi), and Past Phil somehow stole files detailing that process or was possibly even directly involved in the project, but had his mind wiped afterwards. It explains not only why Hinobi would wipe Phil’s mind several times in the past, but also his Phil’s warnings and why he bothered to send his future self a message in the first place.

But more importantly than that big theory that honestly deserves its own post, Polybius has a release date: 1981.

If Bolypius was made in the same year as its real world counterpart and Phil’s message involves Bolypius’ creation like I theorized, the year 1981 lines up with everything else.

It’s 9 years after the invention of Pong/Ping, so Hinobi could be a proper game company with designated Glitch Techs by that time.

That 9 years gives us more than enough time for Phil to have gotten those pictures taken over the course of 3 years.

The 80s were a time where Tie-Dye was in style, lining up with the Tie-Dye Phil picture.

And finally, taking the year 1981 and adding 17 years (the rough amount of time since that last photo was taken) gives us the year 1998, a year that fits with the other bits of evidence perfectly.

Part 3: 1998 Evidence:

1998 specifically lines up with almost all other pieces of evidence I’ve given.

Bolypius’s presumed birthday plus the age of Phil’s messages and photos gets us 1998.

If Emilio Nieves built Ping at the end of his college years or when he was fresh out of college, it’s fully possible for him to make at least 3 other games, have Five, be arrested for hacking and end up in prison by his 40s in 1998. In fact, this is even more likely given that the Ping machine has Hinobi’s logo on it, meaning that Emilio Nieves was a Hinobi employee when he made it. He probably got hired fresh out of college and invented Ping very early in his career, something that is entirely possible because Emilio Nieves is a master programmer.

The year 1998 is the exact year that Metal Gear (1998) came out, perfectly lining it up with the in-universe Spec Ops that came out in the current Glitch Techs year.

Arcades like we see in the show were popular in the 90s, albeit losing popularity at the time, and as even more evidence, the 80s and early 90s were the time when animatronic restaurants were at their most popular, lining up with in-universe things like Joystick Jr’s using animatronics when Five was a kid.

However, there’s still the existence of high speed internet, streaming and social media (in an early 2000s-like state), VR games, smartphones and TVs (which both resemble the 2010s versions of themselves).

Luckily for that, we have an explanation in the form of Hinobi’s high tech tomfuckery. More specifically the impact it would logically have on the rest of the world’s technology and technological advancement.

High speed internet can be explained by the invention of plixels, which are supposed to be an extremely compact and fast form of data storage. The invention of that technology would 100% kickstart the internet into a version that’s a lot closer to the modern version in terms of availability and speed. Even without directly using plixels, their invention would kickstart the invention of other high speed data storage technologies that would also bring the internet up to our modern speeds.

The extremely fast upgrading of the internet courtesy of plixel technology would also probably kickstart things like social media and streaming into becoming a thing way earlier than normal, but we see that it’s still not completely known by everyone.

Hinobi’s advanced technology (at least the stuff it actually sells) could also end up influencing things like smartphones into existing early and speed up the development of TVs from bulky CRTs to the significantly less bulky plasma screens (presumably they’re plasma screens based on their looks) we see in the show. The extremely fast advancement of the internet may also affect the invention of smartphones. They’re not as advanced as the modern stuff we have as they resemble smartphones and TVs from the 2010s, but they’re still more advanced than what you’d normally see in 1998.

VR being common and actually more advanced than 2020 VR is just Hinobi being Hinobi.

So TLDR: Glitch Techs takes place in the year 1998, in a universe where certain technologies were heavily influenced and advanced by roughly a decade or two due to Hinobi’s high tech tomfuckery.

#glitch techs #headcanons #theory #Five #hector nieves #miko kubota #Polybius #Bolybius #I have no idea what tags are used for the Glitch Techs fandom so I’m using any I can think of #actually who am I kidding Glitch Techs has no fandom at this point it’s like 4 people not including me #oh yeah almost forgot:#long post

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hedgethemaze · 6 months

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I stumbled upon this meme, a couple of days ago and I thought, since it's been quite a while since I posted anything LoK related reblogs don't count it would be cool to give it a go, while also freshen up some of my views on the series and... *he he he* while I was hoping for some of them to have changed over time, I see that most of them didn't🤣

Original template done by: purfectprincessgirl on deviantart

A bit of analysis is under 'keep reading', plus, some silver medals because like half of these weren't as easy to sort out as I thought 😅

WARNING: Long post ahead!

Favorite Character

Asami is no silver medal, she's the gold for me! Honestly, she should be the one in the image above (my n°1 favorite character in the series). The main reason I chose Korra for it was for the sake of not having repeats (she's my 2nd most fav character) 'cause Asami is unarguably my number one pick in another category (more on that way below)

Least Favorite Character

The author of the meme describes this category as follows: "LoK character you dislike the most, and they either annoy/bore you too much to ever enjoy their presence whenever they're on-screen"

Runner-up

Raiko embodies this definition to a tee, yet what Zaheer does to Korra during their confrontation in the Book 3 finale is plain torture and really painful to watch. I don't just dislike Zaheer, I hate the guy!

If it wasn't for the airbenders' intervention, he could and would have killed her - something Raiko would never be capable of, or even think of doing. Basically, he gets a pass for being harmless lol

Favorite Episode

This one may have been the hardest I had to consider. The runner-ups are too many to count, so I had to resort to the author's meaning yet again, to decide.

Long Live The Queen is an exciting episode with a lot going on - some of it being quite serious and grave, but with enough lightheartedness to not be an agonizing watch.

Watching Korra and Asami working as a well-oiled machine to escape not only imprisonment by the Earth Queen's men but also the dangers of the desert is a blast (plus, the more Asami gets to show off her skills and have relevancy in an episode, the better). Meanwhile, Mako's struggle and failure at getting Bolin to metalbend, Lin finding Naga and Pabu, and Korra getting to meet Zuko for the first time on screen are moments that lift off some of the tension from the fact that the Red Lotus are rapidly gaining on their hunt for the Avatar the on-screen assassination of the Earth Queen.

It's because of the balance between these elements that I chose this episode over the one I consider to be the best episode in the entire series.

Runner-up (among many!)

Korra Alone is a masterpiece of animated media and one of the best written episode in all of the avatar-verse.

To me, it cemented the titular character as one of the most significant, ground-breaking and inspiring protagonist of all time - I could go on and on about how great of an episode this is but I don't think I need to - yet, it's because of the heavy topics it deals with that I don't prefer it over many others...I love the episode immensely, but to see Korra go through such despair and torment is not exactly my idea of a good time😅

Least Favorite Episode

Quite the opposite to choosing a favorite episode, my least favorite episode has always been clear, no runner-ups needed.

In short, Beginnings is my least favorite episode because it is the answer to a question I never asked, as I stated at the end of this post of mine almost two years ago (see n°34). It is really hard to sit through these episodes for me.

Now, if you want a more fleshed out explanation - which, in turn, touches on some of the reasons why I picked my least favorite season as well - I encourage you to watch THIS video on youtube by Hello Future Me, if you're interested.

Favorite Season

I made this choice easier by counting how many episodes I love from each season, against how many I just like, otherwise it'd take me more than a day to make up my mind. As a result, Change won with me favoring 10 out of its 13 episodes, giving it a score of 77%.

With that in mind, the runner-up is...

Me loving 9 out of its 13 episodes gives it a score of 69%.

Looks like I'm on the boat that considers the second half of the series to be the "better" half, huh. I still would've placed Book 1 as the runner-up, thought - for two reasons only: Asami's untapped potential in that particular season and having more screen-time and dialogue than in Book 4, and me liking the main antagonist more (despite some issues I ultimately have with his execution).

*ehem* Anyway, Balance also has a far better finale in its favor, so it wins its silver medal fair and square!😁

Least Favorite Season

Even without giving it a score - which I still did, 43%, 6 out of 14 episodes - Spirits is my least favorite season, bar none.

Though, much quicker than talking about what I didn't like about this season (again, you can watch THIS video by Hello Future Me), is to talk about what I did like:

Delving into Korra, Tonraq and Senna's family dynamic (Unalaq gets included here but only for the first 4 episodes of the season), the introduction of Bumi and Kya, and their sibling dynamic with Tenzin and the appearance of Uncle Iroh! - these are the aspects, I think, the season touches on perfectly.

Then there's the not-so-perfect bits I still enjoyed, even though they went nowhere or got resolved in an unsatisfying way, like: Mako's detective work on the bombing of the SWT Cultural Center and finding out who's stealing Future Industries goods, which pushes Asami to having to sell a controlling portion of her company to no other than the one making profit out of the civil war between the tribes😱 Speaking of, Varrick's partnership with Bolin and the introduction of movers war propaganda, was fun but.....well, this is on the not-so-perfect stuff that I liked about Spirits so, yeah.

Most Overrated Character

One of the reasons for me to choose Kuvira is because I never shared other's fascination about her (which in most cases I've seen, it boils down to be either because of her looks, her fighting/bending skills, or both), nor did I ever bought into the parallelism they tried to draw between her and Korra.

But the one thing that could never get me on the Kuvira-train is the show going out of its way to try and give her the Avatar equivalent of Hitler seemingly redeeming qualities. Nothing Kuvira did since her raising to power across the EK, up to the end of the series, is justifiable or excusable.

Even so, I can't ignore the one thing I do like about her and that is Zelda Williams' flawless performance. I especially remember her speech in The Coronation, her delivery gave me chills! Throughout the season, honestly, there's like a haunting quality to her voice - it's like, I don't like the stuff she's saying, yet I still wanna listen lol Truly, she did incredible.

Oh! Almost forgot about the runner-up:

Originally, it was going to be Meelo (a petty choice on my part, I know) I can't believe I'm still salty about Patterns in Time

But I'll give the silver fairly to Zaheer because I seriously cannot get the hype for this guy. Even if he's my first exposure to an airbender actually murdering someone...even if he unlocked the ability to fly.

He may be a skillful martial artist, but if it weren't for the other members of the Red Lotus, Zaheer wouldn't be half as terrifying, imo. And he's also a coward.

Most Underrated Character

*sigh* Asami Sato, my beloved...do I need to elaborate on why this category (in my eyes) goes to no one but her? No matter, I've done it already: here (see n° 25)

It's also quite masterfully, and better explained here by Unicorn of War.

Ironically, I gave this category not one, but two runner-ups

Technically, Mako should be the runner-up.

To me, Korra is just as deserving of being the most underrated, underappreciated, and underestimated character in the whole series as Asami (then again, no repeats) - yet, Miss Sato is also mistreated (no pun intended) not only by others within the series but its creators, as well.

First thought of as one of the bad guys, Mike and Bryan created such an extraordinary character - with a killer design to boot! - who in spite of having less appearances and fewer lines than other 'main' characters, spoke loudly enough to write her own narrative. From the very first time we see her in Book 1, Asami pulled all the stops: She could've been a rival to Korra, an enemy to her friends, an ally to her hateful father...still, she ended up being one of the most compassionate, kindhearted and loyal characters in the series...despite all that, more often than not, the creators simply didn't know what to do with her💔

Now, imagine I didn't write all of that. That I don't put Asami above anyone else here.

Korra is the most underrated character in her own series, everybody knows this. The amount of complaints and criticism she gets to this day, unfairly so, is insane!

As for Mako, let's check the autho's definition of this category: "LoK character that you think doesn't get enough attention, as they're usually almost always forgotten about/bashed-on for the lamest of reasons in your eyes"

Well, in my opinion Mako does get a fair amount of attention, and while he does get forgotten from time to time, so are Asami and Bolin, so that doesn't bother me much. It's the last bit that gets me...

For the most part, he's hated because of the love triangle fiasco - a mess of a plot line that happened literally a decade ago. If to hold that sort of thing over one character isn't lame, I don't know what is - and I say this as a Korrasami shipper, an Asami simp and a Korra stan.

Moreover, these people easily gloss over the fact that both Korra and Asami moved on from that rather quickly, forgave Mako and still are good friends with him. More than underrated, I feel like he's misjudged - because those who complain about him don't take into account why he is the way he is, or rather, was.

They forget that, pretty much like almost everyone in LoK, he had a struggling childhood and went through his own share of trauma (like witnessing the murder of both your parents at the age of eight is no big deal) not to mention he had to be a parental figure and look after his little brother from a very young age, while fending for themselves on the streets...but besides all that, Mako was a 18 y/o teenager putting up a brooding front when the triangle happened, he should be expected to make stupid decisions, jeez!

If I had to blame someone for that mess, even today, it'd be the writers. To those who still shame and bash Mako for it, I'd tell you to either grow up or move on (if you're dumb enough that can't do both)

Favorite Villain

[I feel like, at this point, I've held anyone that's still reading this at gun point for too long. Let's speed up!]

Amon is my favorite villain of the series because of how entertaining he is to watch, maybe part of it has to do with the way he kind of resembles a classic horror movie baddy - he's definitely got the best design out of Korra's main antagonists (and I'm talking about masked Amon, not paint-faced Noatak). Steve Blum's performance is also a hook.

One of the first things I remembered when having to pick this one is how incredible I thought it was, back in the day, to have the first season's main threat be a waterbender. I know they did it first with Hamma in ATLA but she wasn't exactly a main villain.

Anyway, I'm aware Book 1 is quite contrived and it has lots of issues going on and off screen that I don't care to unpack. At the end, Amon is a fraud and, as a thread, he falls flat rather quickly. Despite being wasted potential, he had a good run. At least, he had one thing over Korra no other antagonist has and that's a frightening first impression.

Runner-up?

I don't think I have one...

Least Favorite Villain

Well, I already got Zaheer and Kuvira up there, and there's my 'no repeat' self-imposed rule. Btw, did you notice that it's a rule now? XD

I think it's fitting that my least favorite season has my least favorite villain. Give it up for UnaVaatu! One of the most bonkers concepts this show ever came up with is the 'Dark Avatar' ugh! because an Avatar shouldn't be either pure Light or Dark, sorry, not sorry. Also, spirit energy shouldn't be equal to laser beams - at least Kuvira had crazy engineering and mad science to make it so. UnaVaatu just...did it😂

Runner-up

I had to give Varrick the silver medal, simply because he isn't even a villain (ultimately, that is)...talk about wasted potential, this guy is frustrating in this regard, because he could've been a good one.

But...he had to conveniently spring a conscience in the middle of the last season, he had to turn good (sort of) and have a wedding. Well, at least he's a fun character *shrug*

Favorite Couple

It's all been said before - Korrasami belong together. Their relationship is supportive, caring and loving, and their characters fought against all odds to make it happen. Even if Korra is to answer a bigger calling as the Avatar, and Asami has to be at the helm of the largest company in Republic City, I just know, these two will always be there and committed to each other.

Runner-up

I almost didn't pick a runner-up, because I noticed that besides Korrasami, I don't give too much mind to shipping in this series. Then again, I can't deny that Tenzin and Pema's marriage is refreshing. I love how their personalities gel so well together and how she brings out the best in him.

Least Favorite Couple

When the description for this category said that non-canon ships can apply, well that is it...First, let me say that I never cared what other people ship and I still don't. You ship whatever you want! But I'll be damned if I don't find this revolting...and if there's even the tiniest need for me to explain my distaste for this pairing then there's something very wrong here.

How could anyone ship someone with the murderer of their last living relative - the one they were starting to rekindle their relationship with?! (*sigh* I explained it anyway) Not only Kuvira did it in cold blood, but even after the fact and wanting to atone for her other crimes, she never showed Asami any remorse for it.

(Feel free to correct me if it did happen in the comics, I honestly don't remember)

Runner-up

I know I sound like an hypocrite, I'm sorry. But shipping Amorra should be illegal. Ugh, I hate that I know what their ship name is.

#legend of korra #lok #nickelodeon #the legend of korra #korrasami #asami sato #avatar korra #mako #beginnings #avatar wan #lok tenzin #lok pema #lok zaheer #lok kuvira #amon #pemzin #I got one hell of a headache writing all this #controversy meme

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sapphyreopal5 · 19 days

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I think would be a great idea for you to make a video talking about Gen and Danneel doing black magic. I think people would be interested in your conversation with the psychic guy by your guys messaging each other. After I did read of screenshots from your last post. I am hooked and hungry for want know more information about it, plus I want your opinion about Gen too.

By the way, did the psychic guy message you again? Because I am dying to know what he said more about Danneel and Jensen.

Hello Anon, thank you for the ask. So he and I have been talking some. Some of the same stuff has been said by him multiple but also by me in different words in multiple posts. For a point of reference, this is the first of these screenshots I posted regarding Danneel and Gen's black magic. I have a few more messages I will share below as well. He and I did talk about Hilarie Burton. I know quite a few anti Danneel folks here don't like Hilarie as well, some have said she comes across as fake and such. Interesting fact about Hilarie, she is actually not an incarnated demon like Danneel is but is instead an incarnated dark Faye. Hmmm, does Danneel in fact have a brunette lover or did she just hang out with a brunette? Some people might think she is in fact talking about Steve, which a lot of fellow anti Danneel bloggers here would know about ha ha. The psychic guy did tell a little more about Danneel's said illnesses and a couple more things.

I just might make a video Anon if there's enough demand for it since it takes time to do research, put together screenshots like this, make the video, edit as needed, etc.

As for my opinion on Gen, now that is something I didn't really elaborate on but it can be implied by more recent posts of mine, I don't exactly hold her on a pedestal. Before I elaborate on my opinions of Gen, I wanted to take a chance to address something I recently saw. Namely, a post someone sent me where it seems an Anon was talking about my Hooters post and where the answer talked about how normal that is going to places like that and how this is crucifying him or perhaps holding him to impossible standards. Now come on, I am no Jared hater and in fact overall like him a lot. No one escapes my observations for better or for worse, Jared and Gen included. I do however just about always defend my friends and family, even if I end up telling them they are wrong in private. I never embarrass my friends or family on purpose and wouldn't do this my partner if I had one unlike Gen ha ha.

Because of the fact I am a personality theories nerd, if anyone is familiar with the MBTI I'm big time ENTP. Of course, labels don't describe everything and we are more than just certain things but I am mentioning this because I question EVERYTHING and EVERYONE, it's what I do. Some people just need to get over this.... anyways onto the real topic, just wanted to share that fun fact about myself and a tidbit of my general personality with you all.

I decided to take this opportunity to share screenshots from a Reddit thread on others' opinions on men who frequently go to places like Hooters, Tilted Kilt, Coyote Ugly, and then the other ones mentioned in the screenshots below. I will say especially this comment in my opinion, 'cause it is extremely relevant for why I question this whole Hooters frequenting of Jared's in my book (and notably without Gen being there for the more recent times in recent years): "Depends on context. Once in a while for a birthday party or guy’s night is fine. Routinely/regularly on his own? That’s weird." I like people getting multiple perspectives thrown into one, 'cause I can. That's just how I roll, kids! But hey, if you want to see some other sites that talk about this, you can also check out this Quora question, this Askmen thread (where of course a lot of the guys who answered said it's merely a woman being insecure), another Reddit thread where her husband keeps lying about going to places like this, this girlsaskguys thread, you guys get the idea at this point, don't cha?!

And I am pretty sure this is exactly what all these "crazy, insecure women" are thinking these Hooters waitresses and such are thinking, summarized in a catchy song "Don't Cha" by the Pussycat Dolls. 🎶I'd probably be just as crazy about you if you were my own man🎶

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Nah but man for real, I found it funny how the same day Coyote Ugly photos came out, Gen's hair stylist or something posted this. Was this to validate herself or just her position in her cushy lifestyle. Oops, I meant as Jared's loving wife and mother of 3 children... or did I? Here I answered someone earlier today about Jared going from wanting to retire to being a producer and then ended up being both the lead character and the Executive Producer on his Show "Walker". I provided plenty of direct quotes to show what is being officially said about why he changed his mind on staying in acting. Note that I said officially there being the keyword in the last sentence. My real opinion? I think that Jared started to realize that because he spent so much time away from home that he in a way feels like an outsider, an issue that might've been exasperated by the COVID lockdowns. I can't for the life of me find where that interview was originally from, so if someone wants to chime in I'll gladly give credit :D

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Now I'm going to bring up a couple of quotes directly from this video that was from their Walker Interview on "The Talk" from April 2021 after the midseason finale of Walker. Again coming straight out of Jared and Gen's mouths.

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9:48 What has it been like to to get to work together and live together again? Jared: "Uhh it's been pretty magical I think I think I'll kind of echo something that Gen said earlier which is it's really nice you know. I think as it happens often times mothers will umm put their passions and their talents aside uh when having kids. And annoying so below, 10:12 Um more often than not it's because the fathers are useless. I know I can say that as far as I go, and so she kind of stepped aside from acting for about nine years to make sure that our kids didn't perish so thank god but now seeing her work again in her elements. You know she had gone to school and acted she had her own TV show and then we had met on the TV, she had done movies and this and that and so to be able to show her off you know during COVID times. Con't. 10:55 During COVID times my kids can't come to set because we're all tested regularly. You have to be part of a certain uh grouping tha tyou can only talk with people that you work with, we're all wearing masks and we're all distancesd and so I can't bring friends or family or my kids to set but I can have my wife there because she's on show as well. 11:03 to 11:12: It's date day. So there have been I'll admit there have been a few times where we've been on set and it'll be like 5pm and we're both wrapped. We're like well if we wait a couple hours then the kids will be asleep by the time we get home. Gen starts laughing and says (I think) don't admit that. 11:16 to 11:26: They won't see it, they won't know until a couple more years. (Gen briefly says "catch dinner") Yeah we're gonna be like pretending, let's pretend we're still filming. Uh, let's tell the babysitter we're still filming and let's go get some sushi or something" 11:36 onward And of course, Gen takes a moment to talk about her pet project TOWWN here. Is this about the show Walker or is this about the Jared and Gen show?

Well Jared she certainly made her stance clear in this interview with Dave Hollis (partial transcript included in my post here) how she really felt about you coming home to live with her. Just saying...

"This is the first time I lived with my husband. I know that sounds really crazy but my husband had been filming a TV show for 15 years in Vancouver so when all of this started you know he came down here. He had 2 episodes left and then that was the completion of the series. Personally, it meant that I had to live with him and deal with coparenting which was really stressful like the thought of it. And to make that work, and it was crazy because we were always in this tight bubble with just us and our kids and it really was simplifying. It was you know like the layers are gone. The interference is gone, drama is kinda out the window in a way, and we got to really simplify basic needs. It's so weird how much unlayering we had to do and that's what I'm finding through all of this is a lot of unlayering to get to the core". "I was just talking to someone about this that my favorite relationship with him is a work relationship. Sometimes it's hard to be married to him because he's like, Jared is so interesting because he's so analytical. I mean my husband, I'm going to toot his horn because he's literally one of the smartest human beings I've ever met in my life and it's annoying because he will correct you on words you think he didn't even know. I have a book of SAT words just because I'm like I am going to get him. And so I'll just casually talk about something and use a crazy word in a sentence and he'll be like well you pronounced it incorrectly. It's so frustrating. Also in our marriage he's very giving and emotional and supportive. He's supportive in everything that I've done and I feel really lucky and grateful. I think even more so when it comes to work he is your biggest cheerleader and it's going to be a lot of time together. But funny enough, I think we'll be better at work than sometimes we are at home. Because I'm like, this is how the kids are, this is how I like them, this is the order that I like things in. And it's hard for me to let go I think, at home. but at work, it's just a really nice exchange and I feel really lucky, and he'll sit there too. If he's not working, he'll take it, pull up a chair and talk on the phone and watch at me and I can hear him bragging about me and whether he's doing it for my benefit I don't know but it makes me feel good and I feel really lucky that he does stuff like that."

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Cute how they bring the kids to the set of Walker at times like they did in the promos last week, ain't it? However, being the questioner I am I wondered after a friend brought up a great point: "why didn't she and Jared celebrate watching the Total Solar Eclipse together on April 8, 2024, which was yesterday?" Not like COVID is preventing Gen from bringing the kids on the set CLEARLY. AND why was she NOT taking this amazing chance to advertise the cool Walker Eclipse glasses (therefore advertising HER and HER HUSBAND'S show) but instead chose to advertise yet another company in her IG story? Another affiliate partnership that's probably gonna rake in less dollars than you know, her husband's show (I meant the "family project")? Dunno you all decide...

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I mean also funny how in the post below she was seen wearing one of these "less cool" types of Eclipse glasses during the 2017 Solar eclipse, which I'm saying 'cause they're not as snazzy or sunglasses like. So, not buying the whole "it's because it's more fashionable" type of logic or "she can do whatever she wants". Sure she can but she's in the public eye so her actions and such are free game to criticism. Bite me!

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Point is, Gen is just a walking advertisement. She is fake, she's clearly all about her cushy lifestyle she didn't truly earn (looking at you, black magic!), and frankly I'm pleased that she's got a long ass sentence in "hell" ahead of her (which is funnily enough way longer than Danneel's actually). Also, is it just me or is there something weird about this page excerpt she selected from the book and then comparing it to the attire she chose for the Mom2Summit event this weekend in Nashville, TN? As if the following book excerpt isn't somehow telling about how she REALLY feels without actually saying how she feels...

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A post shared by Charlie Capen (@charliecapen)

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Notice the color of her pants in that post Charlie made has her in turquoise pants. And then go read the above. It starts with: "When we're married, I want us to work together. We'll be a team, and I won't leave you out of matters the way my dad did my mom. She wishes Harv hadn't told her all of this. If he was only using her to prop up his family name, it would be easier to leave him. But he wants a true partnership, one where he would welcome her opinions and thoughts." Another part says towards the end of the page "She pictures Ko Lipe from her poster, the inviting turquoise waves. Her dress flutters around her legs as she heaves one leg over the railing, then the other. On her tiptoes, she surveys the water below her. It's no Thai island but it'll do. She jumps." Also note where she underlined: "Too many expectations. Too many people in her ear saying they're not asking for too much. She gives and gives but still it's not enough."

Not sure how much she's giving here because she's been handed everything on a silver platter and fed by a silver spoon her entire life but what do I know? Turns out she even walked away during this summit towards the end to "take a phone call". From who, your husband who once said was ignoring you in a video and said "come on pick up" in? Feeling a bit petty right now XD

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My bottomline view of Gen is, she tries to portray herself as this homestead type of crunchy Earth hippy mom but then when you look at her closely enough she is a much bigger liar than Danneel is and is much more fake. She is not this great, super supportive wife that Jared for some dumb ass reason keeps trying to make her out to be. For example, I find it funny how just last week she was all about promoting Walker, even including filming Jared with Odette and Shep. Cute right? Until I realized that they didn't even share the moment of the Total Eclipse yesterday, let alone Gen advertised yet another affiliate product instead of her own husband's show. I honestly don't believe the whole oh we can't bring the kids on set rule during COVID. If y'all are the bosses (oh sorry, there's really only 1 and that's Jared NOT Gen) you can make exceptions. What is the CDC gonna do, arrest you for bringing your kids to work? They could've made them stay stuck to their iPads or something, not that hard to social distance unless they're unruly. But then again being the wittle rebel I can be at times, I just think outside the box a lot. Heck, I brought my kid to work with me to my job during COVID and when he did them online schooling sessions and all that on iPad, ain't it so nice being able to work for family? ♥

#divination #psychic #anti genevieve #anti influencers #anti jarevieve #pada marriage is a mess #psychic messages #black magic

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goldenpinof · 2 months

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I'd love to chime in on the wad talk if I may!

I think you saying that you're generally not a big fan of theatre makes a lot of sense as to why for you it didn't necessarily have to be a stage show. I work in live events and I absolutely adore theatre and such so to me it made a huge difference that it was a live show rather than a video. Which is why I think the blanket statement of 'it could have been a video' doesn't work, because the experience of the show is so subjective, especially with the topics Dan talks about. It might not be the most innovative show but I def think the emotional aspect for me and many others was the way it was because it was live and you could experience the energy of the room. That's not something that can be translated to video, simply because it's not the same medium and a certain layer of what the show's about get's lost if you change it! I think it will be interesting to see how different the experience will be now that we will have the recording of it tomorrow, I can imagine for some it might be the same as it was in person, but I also think for other people it might not be the same and both are totally valid! I think Dan choosing the live stage show over a video does deserve to be noted tho, because there is a level of vulnerability and honest that comes with speaking to people directly and in person that gets lost when you have a video and that was a very deliberate choice. He's always done his work with the security layer of the camera and youtube and him choosing not do this, when sharing so much with us in wad I think matters.

just my little thoughts from someone who adores theatre and live comedy and everything else that's 'in person'!

"the energy of the room" aka people around you, not only Dan. Dan likes getting live feedback, so i get why we went on tour. i still think that his show can be easily adapted into a video based on what i remember.

i think there's a difference between working with the audience and getting a reaction from the audience. and since wad is so heavily scripted it was the latter. he wasn't working with us, he was getting a reaction and moving on to the next bit. which is fine, it's not a stand-up. but a lot depended on how the audience was perceiving jokes and audience's ability to include itself in the show. Warsaw, for example, was very loud, and since the venue was small, people could hear each other and it made the whole experience a bit crazy. like, the fun was coming from both sides, so it was never boring. we were responding as a union to the things Dan was saying (e.g. communism and later putin), but also some people were yelling relevant jokes in response to Dan, thus making everyone laugh. in Berlin, i had a completely different experience audience-wise. the venue was much bigger, we couldn't really hear each other, thus no jokes coming from the seats that could bounce off of what Dan was saying. he was interacting only with the first 5-ish rows, and everyone else was just watching. we could still scream shit for the bit, but it didn't really matter. god, big venues were such a miss during wad, imo. BUT the show itself was better in Berlin because some things were improvised and the stage was bigger so he could move more. i'll try to explain what i mean by "the show could be a video". adjust the bits where we "choose" something by screaming and it's a video. it's him showing us shots and talking. and no matter what we scream or if we scream at all, the show would go on. no matter if the joke lands or not. he has a script and he follows it. sometimes he removes parts of it depending on the venue (aka the cubes, asking people to twist his hand and use the gavel), he also can remove parts if something goes wrong aka the bubbles. a lot of audience participation can be removed. and without it he would still have a lot to show and say. and this could be a video because the script doesn't heavily depend on the audience participation. if the show was more improvised that would be a different conversation. if you think that this show couldn't be a video because of the audience then it's your experience with the audience more than with the show. have a mid audience and remove some bits and that's a video. it's not a bad thing, idk why people are mad at me. the show is not bad, it's just not for everyone. i'm also curious how people will see the filmed version of wad. both those who saw it live and those who never saw it. people who weren't at the venues aren't gonna participate, so it's a different experience. some things will depend on the editing, but i would love to hear people's opinions on the show itself. we all love Dan and wish him success. i'm a dannie through and through ffs, he shines on stage, i'm not arguing with that. seeing him live is better because of how he enjoys being there. and seeing so many phannies in one place making each other giggle worth buying a ticket. but i'm interested to see reviews on the show.

#watch me watching the livestream tomorrow and changing my opinion #honestly i'd love to see the show live again. in a mid-size venue. 2 places aren't enough data to form a normal opinion #exactly because the experiences were so different #answered #wad #wad.warsaw #wad.berlin

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destinyc1020 · 4 months

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https://youtu.be/yTHkWoBgrR0?si=a--7HeUFBjJIjA0U

I know this might be a tired topic for you, but I watched this video a few weeks ago, and this video was inspiring to any fan of a favourite actor. Matthew Mcconaughey is so inspiring because, like Cillian Murphy and even Daniel Craig, they are svtors who've acted lost in their lives but have had periods of their acting career their peak. In the video at 8:23, Matthew talked about how there was a point where he was the romcom guy and though critics gave him slack foe it, he was grateful for those roles because they kept him financially afloat and he was happy with those roles.

However, creatively, they weren't challenging him, and he decided to make a executive decision and take a risk on his career from being typecast and started to say no to anymore romcom roles for a 1 to 2 yrs. I remember I watched a Heath Ledger interview in the 00s where he also talked about doing the same thing after 10 things i hate about you. A lot of actors you claim are not employed would just be saying no to a lot of offers cause as we know Hollywood loves making a lot of money doing the same thing, lol.

When Matthew came back from that hiatus, he was offered more complex roles such as Killer Joe, Lincoln Laywer, Mud, Magic Mike the list goes on...

Funfact: Christopher Nolan watched Mud, and that was the film that got Matthew interstellar. It's fun to me because the film wasn't commercially great and moderately acclaimed, but it goes to show top ppl in the industry to keep tabs on you when you least expect it.

Ever since I was that video and read up Matthew's story, I haven't worried about Tom ever. I actually think he's in the best peak of his career. The expectations on him from the critics are so low that way he has room to breathe and do work without ppl expecting him to save cinema, lol.

Low expectations breed high rewards. Cillian Murphy is getting his flowers now, but he's been acting since he was a teen, and most of his projects have been mixed sometimes. He's the best thing in them. The beauty of doing projects that are so challenging and different, whether ppl watch, is that it stretches the acting skills of the actor, and that's why Cillain was the perfect Oppenheimer.

So to Tom, fans who are worried about his career and compare him to the yt boy of the month, notice that he has been acting since he was a child and how consistent his career has been. He will always be relevant, like episode 8 for TCR got Twitter in a frenzy. Like I don't worry about at all because Tomvoodoo will prevail lmao.

Sorry for the dissertation xxxx

youtube

Thank you Anon for your input! 😊

I'm going to have to watch Matthew's video later, but your comments were very interesting and had a ring of truth in it.

I have to admit that even I was usually used to Matthew doing mostly comedies growing up, so it was kind of a shock to me when he started doing more serious roles, and I myself was even a little skeptical on if he would really be able to pull it off. But he did! 😁

I think many ppl probably forget that Matthew actually started off his career in the John Grisham legal drama "A Time to Kill" (GREAT book, and GREAT movie btw!). So he had already proven that he could do it. He had just started to get typecast later on in his career. Honestly? I think that's what happens more often than not in Hollywood. 👀

Some actors decide to just take a break, regroup, and then come back and totally revitalize their careers by picking different roles.

Like you said, it's not like these actors aren't being offered any parts, it's usually more so that the parts being offered to them are not the ones that THEY want to do.

So yea, good points Anon. 👏🏾

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tellthemeerkatsitsfine · 11 months

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There’s a video on YouTube of the finals of the 1995 Open Mic Awards, broadcast on the BBC in September, 1995. I haven’t seen it before, but I think this calls for a post in which I write my thoughts down live as I watch.

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- Right off the bat, here’s Barry Cryer telling us about the recent stand-up comedy boom, and he lists the most important, moneymaking comedians who’ve been to the Fringe: Monty Python, Rowan Atkinson, Jo Brand, Julian Cleary, Eddie Izzard. So I guess it’s 1995.

- They announce at the beginning that it’s a contest for any comedians who’ve never been paid to do stand-up comedy before, they started with over 500 and now they’re down to 8. So that’s sort of cool, that we talk (well, I talk about this, maybe other people don’t so much) about what comedians started at the same time as each other, but any who are in this have started at exactly the same time, having never been paid for it before but now being good enough to make this shortlist.

- Oh, here’s Boothby Graffoe hosting the event, a man whom I know as a voice on Radio 4, looking a lot more telegenic than I picture most people on Radio 4.

- First judge is Tony Hawks (the S is important there, not the skateboard guy), the guy who wrote two books that are on my shelf: Round Ireland with a Fridge, and One Hit Wonderland. I read both those books about ten years ago and recall them being quite funny and the former making me really want to go to Ireland. I mean, I already wanted to do that, and that’s why I read the book, but the book made me want that even more. Looking back, it's possible that that book may have been vaguely condescending, an Englishman saying "look how cute and quirky Ireland is." But if that was the case then I didn't pick up on it at the time.

- “[The stand-ups in this competition], they’ve not really done it much for money… if you’ll pardon the expression…” Tony Hawks making a joke right at the beginning in which I think he’s called Lee Mack an aspiring whore (it’s relevant to know that Lee Mack is one of the finalists).

- I apologize for anything I said about assuming voices on Radio 4 are less-than-telegenic. The next judge is Sandi Toksvig, and she has never, ever been less-than at anything.

I’m so pleased to see her that I’ll even overlook Boothby Graffoe using the word “comedienne” to introduce her.

- I’ve not heard of the next judge, apparently he’s an important decision-maker at the BBC. Or he was one of those, at least. Now all the decisions are being made by... oh God, I'll end this point here, I've done enough ranting about the cancelation of BBC topical comedy lately, I won't get into it again, I promise.

- Barry Cryer is the fourth and final judge, and they immediately make several jokes about how incredibly old he is. In 1995. His recent death was very sad, but he did have a long run.

- Barry Cryer on what he looks for in good stand-up comedy: “Originality. No sex, 70s, or Star Trek.” That's interesting to me. In the last 10 years, 90s nostalgia has been everywhere. In 2023, 00s nostalgia is taking hold (I don't mean to be dismissive about that, it's certainly taken hold of me). In 1995, someone was complaining that 70s nostalgia was so ubiquitous it had become unoriginal. As, apparently, had Star Trek and sex.

- I’ve seen pictures and videos of Baby Lee Mack before, I know what he looks like, I was prepared for this. But still, Jesus Christ.

- There is an amazing contrast between how much Lee Mack has physically changed since this video (drastically), and how much his comedic style has changed (not at all). It’s not my favourite comedic style, but I do respect it when it’s done well, which I think it is in Lee Mack’s case. And to be fair, he did make me laugh a few time in the set from this video. His stand-up DVDs made me laugh as well, when I watched them a few years ago.

It's now been more than two years since I watched Lee Mack’s stand-up DVDs, but I still recognized a couple of jokes from this 1995 set – they made it into his first DVD, which was released in 2007. His later shows no longer recycled exact jokes from 1995, but they never changed style.

I also respect a comedian who decides what they want to be early on because they truly love that thing, and then they continue to love it enough to stick with it. And I think that is real for Lee Mack, I’ve read his autobiography and so much of it’s about being really into the comedians who came before him and did that style. Comedy changed around him as he grew up, he definitely saw the alternative comedy stuff and then the other styles that branched out from there, but no, he wanted to be one type of comedian that is what he did. It's worked damn well for him, credit goes to Lee Mack for that.

- Next up are three comedians I hadn’t heard of, a couple of whom were a bit funny, followed by:

John Oliver has some stand-up jokes in his early career about how he looks like he’s Jewish, and I never understood those jokes until I saw pictures of him from even earlier in his career, when he did look exactly like a young David Baddiel. He wrote those jokes back when he looked like that, so people probably did often assume he was Jewish, and then kept telling them even after he didn’t look that much like that anymore.

I think I’ve just had a similar moment of understanding about all the jokes in The Mighty Boosh based on Julian Barratt’s eyes being too small. By the time they filmed the Mighty Boosh things that I’ve seen, he’d apparently learned to open his eyes properly, because I heard those jokes and thought, okay, they’re a bit small, but not really enough for the jokes to make sense. This, however, suggests that the issues used to be more pronounced. I'm not sure that man even has eyes.

- On the subject of The Mighty Boosh, you know how Julian Barratt’s the straight man there? Apparently he wasn’t always. He packed an impressive amount of offbeat stuff into only a couple of minutes there. Not even really a character act, just fucking weird. Possibly just as weird as the old clips I've seen of Noel Fielding's 90s-era stand-up. I see how they ended up together.

- I’ll be honest, and say the next one is the actual reason I’m here:

Jesus. I've seen a lot of different Daniel Kitson looks from different Daniel Kitson eras, but had not seen that one before. This gives me the same feeling I get from watching his Blockbusters thing, which is... okay, I love finding old footage of comedians I like, but if they're an actual child in that footage, at what point is it a weird thing to have? I think he's actually older here than he was on Blockbusters, but looks younger, possibly because of the shorter hair and/or the vest.

Seeing his age right after Lee Mack and Julian Barrett puts that difference in perspective, too. I’d been thinking that them all being in this means they all started at the same time so are the same comedic generation, but they’re really not. Because that is a small child. It takes a hell of a lot of confidence to think you can do something like this when you’re that young. I say this as someone whose brother started doing stand-up when he was sixteen… it requires an uncommon level of self-regard.

- I’ve now watched the set, and it was primarily about A-level results, his glasses, and his failure to get a girlfriend during high school. I have heard him do material even in his polished shows as an adult about his glasses and his failure to get a girlfriend in high school, and I can even think of a couple of routines that have discussed his A-level results. So he didn’t stop using the topics. Just changed every single other thing.

There was only one tiny bit when the crowd laughed too early, he got mildly annoyed and said that was just a word, that wasn’t the joke, and it was this little flash of reality. Like for about a second and a half, a curtain moved and you could look at this strange teenager and see Daniel Kitson. And then the curtain closed again and it’s just a kid with way more confidence than anyone that age should be allowed to have.

- The video cuts off the ending, but I looked it up and learned that Julian Barratt won. Which makes sense, especially if the judges were, in fact, looking for originality. He definitely had that. A very weird and creative set that would lead you to never guess he's destined for "straight man" status in his double act.

#Youtube

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words-of-wolf · 2 months

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main blog of knifedog-machina here - I have a question! do you have any memories involving scent, and territory markings or prey tracking through that? I've been a bit enthralled with WolfQuest recently, and I wanna know how their visualized scent system holds up for a wolf!

Hello!! I love this question, things like this are some of my absolute favourite things to discuss!!

Gonna put a cut here because I rambled wayy more than I planned. :P

I do have memories of this, yes! It's not a simple answer though, because one problem I run into with some of my memories from other lives is that I don't always have the.. capacity to comprehend them exactly, as a human? It's a weird feeling! I can remember it but some aspects of it are just so hard to grasp.

I think to describe properly how I experience those memories will take some thinking, so I'll stick it on my blog post to-do list and aim to write something more meaningful later on!!

In short, though: I absolutely cannot overstate how central my sense of smell was in my memories of being a wolf. It was like... hm. How humans centre a lot of their understandings of the world and their place in it through our eyes? Like seeing eyes as windows to the soul and all that? Like that, but it was smell instead.

Smell wasn't just a tool, it was a really vital part of how I conceptualised the world and my place in it. I'd say even how I thought about things, and processed things internally, was very focused on smell!

As for your specific question... I've never actually got around to playing WolfQuest yet myself (it's been on my to play list since I was like 16 ahaha) but I watched a couple of videos to see what the scent mechanics in it are like!

Overall, I think they look pretty good! Ideas like scent are always gonna be hard to capture in a game, especially when you've also got to keep in mind limitations of performance and stuff, plus obviously making the game feel actually fun to play.

For the tracking scent mechanic, I really like that they added scent nodes in the air that are influenced by wind! When it comes to tracking something by scent, wind has a really big impact - the way the WolfQuest devs found to make wind relevant without being really taxing on performance is really clever, and interesting!

Territorial markings would be a really difficult thing to represent properly in a game, I think. WolfQuest seems to have a solid solution for that. It's not what I'd call "realistic" exactly, though also they base their game on Yellowstone's ecosystem, which is a very competitive location for wolves. The amount of elk there makes it prime habitat, and that means there's higher wolf density, so territorial behaviours are way more defined and intense than in other places. So some of the things that feel "off" to me, I think also come as a result of that!

It's hard to really articulate my thoughts on territory and marking, I might have to come back to the topic later when I've had some time to mull it over!

Thinking about this got me thinking about how I'd go about making a scent tracking mechanic in a video game... in a fantasy world where I can ignore hardware limitations and how difficult it all would be to code. :P

I think I would format it as a different visual mode taking inspiration from infrared videos. In this camera mode, a lot of visual objects are unclear or ambiguous, particularly anything distant.

And I would use different colours to differentiate three different scent types: yellow would be "uninteresting background scent" - grass, trees, that kind of thing. The stuff you just don't pay attention to. Green would be "distracting non-prey scent" - things that might obscure what you're looking for, or maybe just catch your attention enough to distract you from what you're focused on. Then I'd probably use red as "prey scent".

Things that have a very strong "prey scent" would be bright red and show up from furthest away compared to other scents - for example, fresh deer scat.

Less strong "prey scents" would be harder to discern from further away. These would be things that either are fresh but don't smell as strongly (like the area a deer was resting recently), or older scent sources. These would probably fade to a more orange tone when you're further from them.

I also quite like the idea of older and weaker scents being harder to identify, and maybe something based on the idea of focus - an older, weaker scent would be harder to concentrate on than a fresh, strong one.

And wind would influence how strong the scents are, especially over distance! So scents you're downwind from are clearer and more visually distinct, whereas scents upwind are less so.

If I were gonna make a game based on this, I'd say the mechanics would encourage piecing together clues from scent, sound and sight. There would probably be a separate camera mode for hearing focus, and then the default mode would let you see visual cues if there are any - flattened grass, game trails, marks on trees, etc.

Hm! It's a bit of a tangent but fun to think about, hehe. ^u^

I hope this satisfies your curiosity a bit! :D

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joethetoonfanandoutcast · 2 months

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Four Reasons I Don't Support Suki x Marcus

There is another Sing ship involving the Saluki which I can't stop thinking about or continuing to be tortured by: shipping her with Johnny's dad!

These words cannot escape my mind from the video of Illumination taking risks: "The company is 'going to have to evolve. We can have a commitment strategy to movies as a cinema-going experience and we can layer other business on top of that. There are topics of conversation right now that are very relevant to what we're doing in the future that get into areas that potentially might not please everyone. I think you have to honor the stories that you tell, honor the choices that your filmmakers make, and you have to be willing to not have everybody pleased all the time."

And since high-grossing franchises are constantly milked, that means they'll need new stories and new material, including ones that fans aren't doing yet. Plus, as Illumination insists on animal behavior, it makes sense for a gentle giant like a gorilla to be protective towards a Saluki, one of the most timid dog breeds of all, so that's one "open-minded/I'm not a judgy bastard who should be sentenced to damnation" perspective, and yet, I can't stand the idea of them being romantic partners any more than her and Jimmy being romantic partners.

Here are the four reasons:

1. They've too big an age gap

Okay, Suki is either in her 20's or early 30's, and Marcus...well, most of the characters' ages here aren't clear, but I assume he's in his mid-40's or 50's. And I realize that Sing lacks pairings with the man being two-three decades older than the woman and "HAS TO BE relevant to real life in all ways", but do they really need that? And yes, Johnny could have a stepmom in his life, but does it have to be a woman close to HIS age?

2. They lack the chemistry

Seriously, who thinks Chelsea Peretti and Peter Serafinowicz would have any chemistry?

3. It spells old-fashioned stereotype

I know strong men would be a good shoulder for tough women to be there as a shoulder and make them feel stronger and make them feel more human, but does it have to imply the strong man is as strong as one of those weight-lifters at the circus? Skinny guys can be strong in some way too. And a lot of women today aren't interested in beefcakes, which brings me to this reason:

4. It destroys her better judgement

In her first few minutes of the film, she comes off as this pretty-dresser who comes from the squeaky clean big city and is hard to please (FOR ENTERTAINMENT, btw!) and because she's a lackey for someone muscular and well-dressed (Jimmy) and is loyal throughout the film, due to dogs being loyal, until she betrays him, everyone just automatically assumes she only likes high-quality individuals as much as high-quality shows. Shows and individuals are two different things. Why throw it away other than just to make Ash, Meena, Rosita, Nooshy, and Porsha the girls you want to like that aren't picky?

She has potential to be liked by someone not taller than her and for her to reasonably like them back. That's realistic and not as superficial.

And I can stand the idea of Marcus finding someone to replace Johnny's late mom, just not if it means destroying the mentioned potential Suki had with other characters, or better yet, maybe not have Johnny's mom dead after all. Incidentally, what is it with Illumination and not having characters' spouses present? Marcus, Jimmy Crystal, Clay Calloway (that I can excuse), and we cannot completely conclude that Buster's mom is dead too.

I seriously hope Illumination doesn't force them into being so. I can handle it being done in fanfictions, but not in actual canon because that means they'd have to be canon in every universe (like how Mickey and Minnie are a couple in every universe and so on with other cartoon couples).

#suki lane #big daddy #marcus sing #I do not support this #please don't make this gorilla and dog a pairing in canon #sing 2 #sing illumination

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talenlee · 2 months

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February 2024 Wrapup

Hey hang on, this month normally fits nicely into the schedule with standard numbers! Who put an extra day in this Smooch Month? I guess that means that this year, the year is just a little extra smoochy! But those four weeks and an extra, they are past us and now it is time to reflect on what happened this month, and what I wrote.

If you check this blog periodically, you might have missed all sorts of interesting articles just because, you know, discoverability is hard.

For once I wasn’t completely hosed trying to come up with smoochy games for Smooch Month! I actually had other things that I think I’m going to bump to next year’s Smooch Month and they’ll be, like, still relevant, how cool is that?

Dream Crush, a voting board game that makes that venerable game mechanic really interesting.

Ouendan (Video), a video article on my beloved videogame Ouendan. This is an update and expansion of an older article. I made a flag transition in this one!

Thirsty Sword Lesbians, a TTRPG about inclusivity that made me feel alienated in how reads and presents its player actions.

Hinedere Beat, a lovely little parkour platformer that made me think about a lot of words I don’t use. This one winds up talking about the Nazis!

That’s not all though, because if you check the Talen and Fox playlist, you’ll find that we also played through The Secret of Monkey Island! We selected that one because, even as a 90s point and clicker, it still represented an interesting take on a character relationship, and a girl who is interested in a boy and it’s clear why.

There were also a bunch of story pile articles, talking about smoochy movies and anime!

D.E.B.S., part of our Positronic Collection viewing. It’s a movie about silly spies, and it’s also actually factually about a queer couple!

Tomo-Chan is a Girl, an extremely mid anime that I appreciate because of how much better it made other mediocre anime look!

A Tail of Love, a Hallmark movie, with Fox as guest spot, which we’re happy to watch this time because it’s just boring and doesn’t feature dog theft.

Insomniacs After School, an anime I really love about two people with a common, down to earth problem, and the way the world looks when you can share it with just one person.

That’s not all the articles you can read (or watch, or listen to!) here on press dot exe! I also wrote about a whole range of other topics, and I think these articles are worth a second look if you missed them!

As it was Smooch month, I wrote about a bunch of stuff relating to romance. I checked out some old media’s examples of that, like in the Transformers episode The Girl Who Loved Powerglide, or the Animorphs shipping couple of Tobias and Rachel in Can A Bird Love a Falcon. I feel like that joke is a little too subtle. I also reflected on a romantic anime of my youth, and how modern discourse are replicating old conversations with The Ranma 1/2 Subreddit is Repeating History, and that then built out idea space for a consideration of the commonality between Homestuck and Ranma 1/2 with Homestuck 1/2. And since we’re talking anime I reflected on how much I liked the anime Shikimori’s Not Just A Cutie because of how it represented non-het, non-mono romance even though it absolutely does represent that with The Unhinged Performative Heteronormativity of Shikimori’s Not Just A Cutie.

Rounding that out and with a slightly darker take, I also wrote about my experience observing fundamentalist churches interacting with some of the hardest experiences couples have with Fundie Divorce, and then reflected on the way we’ve been ‘told’ relationships should work with an article about the history of Remote Romance.

Finally, I spent some time on D&D related stuff, looking at Sanders and Danube from Cobrin’Seil as places who could represent Yuri, and the strange commonality of Love Potions as purchaseable devices and what that meant about the world and its economy. I also wrote 4e for Two, as an article about how you might want to arrange the game for a two player experience.

Also, if you’re a fan of my custom magic cards, I put out two articles about this year’s Magic The Gathering set Vox Maxima: cards and story.

This month I made a shirt that tried to wed my familiarity with overly ornate stained glass from Wealthy Church Members’ doors and high-up windows, and also my love for easy geometry.

If you want, you can get this design on a sticker, or a shirt!

February is the last month of summer here, and the weather has become more extreme. Hot days are hotter, and then they’re punctuated with heavy, rainy days. The humidity in my area is a constant part of summer days, because I’m near two bodies of water. The sun hits the water, the water fills the air and the temperature can’t get too high because of that. Means the weather report says ‘oh yeah it’s like 29 degrees’ and that’s not so bad but then you check and it’s 80-90% humidity. The result is now that weather forecasts in my area include the stat ‘feels like’ and that has hovered around the mid 30s pretty consistently.

It’s not like it’s the hottest place in the world — I can just imagine people assering ‘well it’s over 40 in’ — and I don’t care. What I care about is how not being able to sleep has messed with my everything. Sleeping and eating are the two things that I keep thinking about when it comes to this time – I don’t do things that involve cooking heavily in the oven, because of the weather and all, and sometimes I’m up until 3 in the morning just because I can’t sleep and then I spend that time being unhappily watching biblical documentaries. I guess in the context of food I’ve been eating a lot of lentils? I got that point where I stopped buying canned lentils and started buying dried lentils (in a mix) and just keeping a little tub of them in the fridge soaking in water so any time I want to make A Food, I will just grab some of the lentil mix and use that instead of like, minced meat or chicken.

I have however, spent every week of this month aggressively getting words into my literature review, which I glibly call to my friends ‘The Word Pit.’ Every week has had a section drafted, with the attempt to make a schedule that gets my production up to pace for when the semester starts. I feel good about this pace of change, and I feel good about getting this kind of progress going, but it does also mean that every day I feel like I wake up and I have to generate two piles of words and this blog is the much easier one to generate.

Friends have gone through some rough stuff this month. Not putting their stuff on the streets, but it’s happened and I’ve been trying to be there for my friends while also acknowledging that I need to generate a few thousand words a day for an incredibly important project.

Check it out on PRESS.exe to see it with images and links!

#Diary

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murdockmeta · 11 months

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Do you think Matt's blindness has to do with him not really grasping the fact his videotapes got leaked?

hello, nonny. i take all asks in as good faith as possible. but i feel the need to note that the way you worded this can be easily interpreted as infantalizing and therefore ableist.

I'm going to interpret this as you asking: how do you think Matt's disability interacts with how he experienced this situation? and do you think it has to do with why the severity of the leak wasn't properly addressed?

I don't see why it would. except that this does make me think of Matt's whole "sometimes I'm glad I can't see things cause then I'd actually be afraid" line. but I really don't see Matt taking it lightly, especially since the videos featured Kirsten.

this is kind of an interesting thing to think about because of the way the age Matt was blinded interacts with what generation he's (currently) a part of. he would've been blinded before digital cameras/videos and the internet were really big. so in THAT context, I'm sure he'd have a skewed concept of the situation.

but I still don't think he'd have any problem grasping how serious it is. he's obviously familiar w cameras and the internet and all that, it's relevant to his career in a pretty big way as well.

maybe it'd make it easier to not think about but I have a feeling that Matt would've done something to have those more intimate moments removed in as much of a capacity as possible. he'd have the connections to do that pretty thoroughly

I think the reason it wasn't better addressed is because Matt had a LOT more going on at the time. there wasn't really time to process everything. and it wouldn't have been as big of a deal after his identity as daredevil was erased. I'd imagine it'd still impact his career, though, along with Kirsten's. especially Kirsten’s. and I think Matt would be more concerned about her than himself (especially since the reason it happened was because of him) but I'm getting off topic

to answer ur question, no. not really. i think the lack of his opinion had much more to do with the severity of other elements of the situation. Matt had relatively more important things to worry about. and let's not forget the fact that daredevil writers are cowards who rarely want to properly deal w Matt's trauma

#it sounds like ur saying 'matt cant understand [thing] because hes blind' which is. a concerning mindset.#matts blindness has nothing to do with his ability to comprehend the seriousness of a situation #its never said that matt doesnt grasp the situation. it was just NEVER addressed.#which is disappointing from a readers context because i think waid was trying to highlight how dangerous tech and the internet can be #but he didnt address the smaller things. which can be understandable. he only has so many panels and issues.#and he needed to make sure the rest of his story had time to make sense #but i could also understand nonny interpreting matt not addressing it as him not processing it fully #daredevil comics #ren replies #mark waid #long post #kinda #tw ableism #<- just in case

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rococospade-main · 2 years

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I've got a bit of an odd question, you've mentioned glove language a few times when writing Laurence and I was wondering if you had any resources/notes on it? I've spent a fair few hours trying to find helpful resources but to no avail lol. Don't feel pressured to answer this of course! I adore your writing and hope you're having a wonderful day!

So, this is the second version of this answer. The first one was shorter but much, much messier. I apparently had a lot to say on the topic. Thank you, anon, I’m glad you enjoy my fics (and enough to go looking into something from one of them)! The answer about resources is… uh, kinda.

Alright, so I’m gonna be upfront: these have citations, but the citations mean very little to me. I don’t have the academic grounding to speak to how accurate these are, and I’d ask you to treat this as a basis for hobby and fiction only. That being said, most sites talking about glove language are going to source one book from 1890: The Mystery of Love, Courtship and Marriage Explained by Henry J Wehman. (By the by, there are several guides to etiquette and manners from the Victorian period, and some of them are really funny.) If you want more detailed or vetted information about Victorians, I’d actually recommend jumping around the historical essay section of YouTube. Bernadette Banner has a lot of really cool videos on period clothing, just to start.

Resources first:

This is the site I used when I was writing bits with glove language in Bloodborne fics last year. The page inludes an illustration showing different glove lengths (measured by buttons) https://victorianweb.org/art/costume/gloves.html

For a version that’s more accessible to e-readers, this has the relevant image transcribed: https://www.geriwalton.com/gloves-and-flirting-language/

Here’s some on handkerchief and fan flirtations: https://susannaives.com/wordpress/2012/02/the-mystery-of-love-marriage-and-courtship-explained-handkerchief-and-fan-flirtations/

Some stuff about rings and love letters: https://susannaives.com/wordpress/2012/06/victorian-lessons-how-to-flirt-with-gloves-the-importance-of-ring-position-and-writing-love-letters-that-get-you-married-or-not/

And some images talking about parasol, window, fan flirtations: https://mollybrown.org/the-language-of-flirtation/

Some notes about how I approach writing details in Bloodborne:

Usually I’ll find out about something by accident, google it a while, make a few notes, and then run with something I think would be interesting. This isn’t the best way to go about it, and I’m certainly missing nuance and details by handling it like this, but it’s fun and it gives readers something to follow up on their own time if they care to.

With gloves, I’d encourage you to look into the variety of nonverbal languages the upper classes used to communicate in Victorian England (floriography, handkerchief, fan and glove flirtations are probably the most prominent) and consider how they might end up applied. Bloodborne being a Japanese game blends really nicely, since Japanese is also a fairly indirect language and culture, so meaning can be inferred by layering in details and context.

Some real life notes about gloves: gloves were expensive, historically, and the patterns and techniques to make them are guarded by guilds. Handmade gloves tend to be better quality and more expensive; you can tell if a glove is handsewn by checking the fingers. Pointed fingertips are handsewn gloves, while machine-sewn gloves are squared off. I tend to draw workman’s gloves with square tips even if them being handsewn would make more sense (Gehrman seems like he’d make his own gloves) for the rougher appearance it grants. Kid leather is a high-quality leather made from kids (young goats) that’s valued for being supple, thin, but reasonably durable. You can learn more about leather finish by looking at the wikipedia page for grades of leather. Kid leather gloves were a very expensive accesory, the sort of thing you’d expect to see at a ball. Cainhurst gloves are probably Kid leather.

For the Victorians, a glove was a symbol of good breeding, and functioned both as a fashion accessory and a way to keep the hand clean and unmarred (as marred hands were considered a mark of… well, labour.) For the Church Doctors, the gloves also inoculate them against disease (Laurence please get that out of your mouth my god) and keep them from cutting their fingers on glass or rough materials. So you’ve got this intermingling of a social ideal (perfect smooth hands) and a functional one (not getting sick because you cut your finger) and then blend in questions of fashion and taste and, possibly, more functionality (colour, cut, decoration). On the note of decoration, Victorians had a lot of ways to make things look more expensive than they really were. Pearls made of paste, or paper-mache finished to look like gold, comes to mind. So it’s possible that people who want to have a rank in the Church but haven’t quite managed, are trying to dress up their gloves (or any part of their costume) to look more important than they are. So with that you might utilise subpar stitching, obvious or sloppy patch jobs, or decorations like fake pearl buttons.

Also! Gloves are fitted! It’s easy to forget since we live in a world with one size fits all garments, but a glove would’ve been made for someone, usually — which means they aren’t interchangeable, and it’s obvious if someone is wearing poorly fitted or stolen gloves, because they don’t quite fit. This would also be an impediment to their work, as anyone who’s ever tried to do anything with badly fitting gloves on can attest.

Gloves might have started as something only worn by ranking members, or at least, the nice gloves (gauntlets aren’t cheap either, but they’re not specialised for delicate work the way I suspect the Choir gloves are), and trickled down to all but the poorest hunters later as they realised that the less skin a hunter exposed, the less likely they were to become afflicted. I’m very interested in the idea of Yharnam’s fashion trending towards covering up as the disease worsened, probably mirroring some real world trends in the process (for example, in North America, fashion silhouettes tended towards straight lines during the 1920’s at least in part because it was considered gauche to try to look curvy while the poor were starving to death).

The Choir gloves aren’t actually tight in the game or the concept art, by the by. They’re loose, and fastened at the wrist with laces, making them adjustable. I haven’t seen laced gloves in a period reference, but it’s a very interesting detail; it would be more adjustable than buttons, though perhaps as likely to catch on things. It also echoes the lacing down the sleeves of the Choir robes, which is just nice from a design angle.

Gloves came in more colours and styles than white and short/long. At one point, lavender day gloves were a thing for men to wear while visiting acquaintances. (The visiting is a whole other thing. If you don’t know about Victorian visiting, I highly recommend giving that a quick search. Calling cards for gentlemen were a thing, and some of them were really weird.)

A note that’s somewhat disconnected from the rest, but feels relevant: Victorians had a mourning period after the death of a family member, where all of a mourner’s clothing was expected to be dyed black, including gloves. (This was apparently achieved with a large vat of hot water, dye, and pushing the fabric around inside with a stick. I’m still fascinated by the concept.) And fashion in general was much slower in this period: people had mostly the same pieces of clothing from year to year, repairing them regularly and modifying them to keep up with current trends. Patch jobs would be another useful way of gauging a character’s status, since subtle or invisible mending is something that amateurs usually aren’t capable of managing. A well-maintained (or outright replaced) item speaks to the owner having some spending money.

The Victorian period had a lot of really specific details that won’t necessarily make sense without historical grounding. I’ve felt like I’m trying to learn another language over the last two years from working on Bloodborne fic, to be totally honest with you, and it’s involved a lot of period literature, looking at fashion plates, listening to various videos on historical fashion… there’s a lot of resources if you know where to look, and I’ve barely scratched the surface. That being said, I’m less interested in the romanticism of the era and more of all the unpleasant things that their day to day culture thrived on (and was used to cover up). The gloves end up being a really nice way to talk about it: an expensive status symbol that protects the wearer from harm, and has probably come to have threatening connotations in the eyes of the populace. Can’t you just picture citizens shrinking back from the sight of black Church gloves?

All of this to say, minding a Hunter’s gloves is probably an excellent way of determining their general status. Compare a Choir member’s immaculate gloves to a wannabe cleric with amateur-sewn, slightly discoloured leather, and paste-pearl buttons trying to bluff their way through the Church, to a Workshop Hunter’s scabbed work gloves, to the ashy, oil-stained, reinforced gauntlets of a Charred Hunter.

Hopefully there was something of use in there for you, anon. As a sign off: the Victorian period had veils as a fashion accessory for ladies, and those are totally applicable to Bloodborne as well. If you need clothing references, look up Harper’s Bazar fashion plates plus the year or decade you’re aiming for. This can be done for outfits or accessories. A lot of items in this period were homemade or modified; richer houses might buy all new accessories or clothes from the best shops, but middle-class houses were more likely to… well, buy one or two new items of middling quality and then modify them to look better, so far as I can find. Whether a glove was kept in good repair by house staff or the owner, or… not kept in repair at all, would tell you a lot. And paying attention to that sort of subtlety is at its heart how glove language functions anyway: looking for context cues to draw inferences before you choose to speak.

Going to close out again with, I am a hobby writer learning about this stuff on my own time. If you have something relevant to add, please feel free, but if you’re looking for definitely-historically-accurate information on the period, I would at most use this as a jump off point to search and verify things. I hope this was of some use, and happy writing!

#Bloodborne #Victorian period #writing reference #guys seriously I’m not a historian please take this with all the salt #Fic writing reference #lore speculation #Victorian fashion

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