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rainofaugustsith · 3 years

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SWTOR: On "too easy"

I keep seeing posts elsewhere from "serious gamers" saying "waaah, they nerfed the game, IT'S TOO EASY NOW." I keep seeing posts from people who seem to think the only way to "save" SWTOR is to make it really difficult. And posts that cast judgment on those who prefer a more laid-back approach.

I can't stand that. Truly, one of the worst things about gaming is some of the playerbase.

I fully believe that where possible, content should have story/veteran/NiM modes available, the way KOTFE, KOTET and the non-story flashpoints do. If someone's idea of fun is to run every single thing with extreme difficulty, and that's what they get a charge from, let them at it...as long as it doesn't mean everyone else has to play that way too. That's where these discussions usually go off the rails, since these folks seem to think that everyone should play at an arbitrary high standard they deem acceptable.

A lot of different types of players love SWTOR. Some really do want NiM all the time. Others want to decorate strongholds or dress their characters. Some are all about story. Some love the group aspect and always want to play with guildies or friends; others steer clear of all interaction with other players. Some do a mix of all of the above. Some avoid certain activities at all costs.

I'm a solo story player. For me, extreme challenge isn't fun. It's usually enough to get me to quit. It's not fun for me to die over and over in a game or to struggle with complicated mechanics where one misstep means death. I hate things like the Onderon datacrons. I felt that Spirit of Vengeance was originally tuned way too high and had way too many mobs, even though I was fully able to finish it.

I've gone in and done some more difficult things like Dread Seeds and veteran flashpoints solo because I wanted to see the content and complete those missions. If the entire game was tuned like the last Dread Seeds mission or those veteran flashpoints, I'd likely leave in about two seconds. In the longterm, it's not pleasant for me. It's physically painful, it's boring and I don't find it relaxing or fun.

No one playstyle is "correct" or "normal." They all are. What's abnormal is when someone insists everyone has to play a certain way. What would I say to those gatekeepers whining about content being too easy?

The story content isn't getting people ready for endgame.

So?

You're assuming everyone wants to play endgame content. They don't. There's nothing Bioware could do, say or bribe me with that would get me into things like Ops, ranked PvP, PvP at all, PUGs or Master Mode flashpoints. Nothing. Nada. Zilch. I am here for the story. Period.

A training ground for endgame content exists in the form of flashpoints. The flashpoints in the game do get progressively tougher. If someone's truly interested in getting raid-worthy skills they're likely going to be doing solo flashpoints. And using groupfinder or joining a guild that works to help players progress. There are options, and those who are interested in raids will seek them out.

But the story is so easy. It's a faceroll. Games are about challenge.

Challenge means different things to different people.

Everyone has different abilities. You might roll through every flashpoint. The next player might die seven times just getting through the first tomb on Korriban. By the way, I'm "next player." I think my first toon may have kicked the bucket before even getting into Ajunta Pall's tomb. The word "easy" is very, very relative.

Also, for some of us, easier content is relaxing and fun. The same way some people like a leisurely bicycle ride along the bike path and others train for the Tour de France.

If challenge for you involves very difficult gameplay, it does exist. Go join a NiM guild for raids. Go play ranked PvP. Play another game. Why does everyone else need to play the way you play?

People aren't grouping. They should be forced to group.

Because you think they should? What gives you any right to dictate how other people play or who they play the game with? Are you the National Gaming Czar and nobody told us?

This "grouping should be compulsory!" belief is bullshit. People who want to group WILL group. That's always been the case. Hell, I remember being a kid and playing single player console games with friends. We'd take turns, cheer each other on, and yell out advice to the person playing. We found a way to play in a group because we wanted to.

Right now, the people in SWTOR there are guilds and healthy incentives to join them. Right now, the people in SWTOR who want to play with a friend or friends can do that. Even in things like class stories or KOTFE where it only progresses for one person, they can still come along and help. There are multiple opportunities in the game for players to meet each other. There are social media sites where they can do the same. There's group finder. There are people who look for groups on the fleet. There are PvP and GSF where they can play against others.

Bottom line? Anyone who wants to group has multiple ways to accomplish that at this very moment.

Those who aren't grouping likely do not want to group. They don't have to explain why. If you force them to group one of two things will probably happen: they will do it and hate every second of it and not want to be there, or they will stop playing. Which is more likely? Well, I'm sure we've all finished Oricon, Iokath and Macrobinoculars, right? Oh wait...

This is a game. It's not supposed to be like a job where you have coworkers you detest and still have to interact with them. It's not some life skill. It's. A. Game. Get over it if people don't want to play with you. There should always be open world PvP. Sure, if you want a mass exodus from the game in about a day. The minute they make open world PvP non-optional or make PvP content compulsory is the day I stop playing. And I don't think I'm alone there. I feel like this comment usually comes from people who are frustrated that others don't accept their duel requests and that there isn't a huge pool of players for PVP matches. They can't get people to play with them voluntarily so they want to force it. And you should be able to tag a mob someone else is working on. I keep seeing this brought up as an ideal in other games. It seems to be a way to force people to group with you even if they've said no to an invite. You know what will happen with this? You'll have players hitting the mob once and getting credit/loot without any effort. Or you will have players following around other players to "share mobs" with them even when that other player wants to be left alone. I'm of the opinion that any type of group play should be consensual in all cases, not forced on players because they happen to be in open world.

*sigh* It's an MMO.

And? MMO doesn't mean "group all the time" or even some of the time. It means a lot of players are co-existing in a shared online world. It means the ability to group should exist - and it does.

People come into group content and don't know what to do.

#1: Everyone starts somewhere. We all know that you were so miraculously gifted that you came out of the womb knowing advanced mechanisms for every boss fight, but most of us didn't.

#2. If you want to play strictly with a team of veteran players, join a guild, make some friends in the game and have fun. That's a lot more realistic than expecting random players in a PUG or groupfinder to meet whatever your exacting specifications are.

#3. Blame the devs for forcing players into Groupfinder to complete Galactic Seasons and other objectives. There are plenty of people who wouldn't be there if that weren't the case.

People come into flashpoints and want to watch the cut scenes.

Hang on. Let me process this. In a story based game, players want to watch the cut scenes? For real? That's completely unreasonable! /sarcasm

In the latest flashpoints, they've more or less removed all the cut scenes. You have your wish granted. For the older flashpoints, there are still many that don't have solo/story mode. The only way people can see those cut scenes is in veteran or master. If you have an issue with this, start advocating to the devs to make solo story versions of those flashpoints. I feel like the bottom line is that everyone has the right to ask for the type of gaming experience they want, but they don't have the right to insist everyone else should share that experience.

#rain talks swtor #swtor #swtor critical #player critical

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mcustorm · 3 years

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In Defense of a Black Cyclops

In case my username didn’t make it clear, the single most anticipated visual project for me is the MCU’s interpretation of the X-Men, which hasn’t even been announced yet [officially]. And ladies and gents, I have found your Cyclops:

Good ol’ Alfred Enoch, who we all know from Harry Potter and How to Get Away With Murder. If you’re not familiar with HTGAWM, know that his character goes from the de facto leader of the ragtag (murderers) and most cherished protege of Viola Davis’ Professor X to taking more of a grimdark turn after his girlfriend’s death. Sound at least somewhat familiar?

Enoch also embodies the physicality of the character well, seeing as to how he’s “slim”, 6′4(!!), black, and notoriously lanky. Wait, one of these isn’t like the others.

In general I hate fancasting. Everyone generally picks from the same pool of about 30 actors (Peeps, neither Taron nor Daniel is a good Wolverine choice. Argue with your mother!), and most all of it is based on physicality, except when it absolutely should be (like say, choosing a ~5′10 dark-skinned black woman for Storm).

And I think there’s some malarkey afoot. I think there needs to be some serious consideration on part of fancasters and actual casting agents alike to rethink race when it comes to the [white] X-Men, especially since they’re the X-Men of all teams. So I’ll make the case for a black Cyclops:

1. There is no quota on Black X-Men: There’s a bug in your ear that’s been whispering lies to you for years, it says something to the effect of “We need a black person on the team for diversity. How bout Storm?” And you’ve gotten complacent. Storm does not have to be the only black person on your X-Men roster.

2. The X-Men represent diversity: Iceman is gay, Cyclops and Prof. X are disabled (sorta), there are plenty of women, oh and everybody except Storm is white. Of the A-List X-Men, there is only *one* POC character. I’d argue that an MCU X-Men needs to champion diversity like never before.

3. The X-Men represent minority struggle while being mostly white: There’s a cognitive dissonance in the metaphor that has always been there, and for the most part, nobody cares. To appeal to the white readers of the 60′s, the X-Men were all initially white. That way, the message of the mutants could be related to the audience with a familiar face. We don’t need to approach the problem that way in 202?

4. Just because that’s the way it’s always been, doesn’t mean that’s the way it should be: The first line of defense. Sorry, that will never be a good justification for literally any idea. It’s time for some more critical thinking.

5. We don’t all want to be Bishop: So say you’re white and you have a kid who for his birthday having a costume party. You’ve bought some X-Men costumes and you want each kid to pick one. 9 white kids and one black kid show up to your house. As the kids deliberate who gets what costume, be it Cyke or Wolvie or whatever, you yell at everybody to “STOP!”, point to the one black kid and tell him “You’re gonna be Bishop. That’s it, end of story!”

We don’t all want to be Bishop. The black child could have the best Cyclops interpretation within him, but you’ll never know if you don’t let him try. And that’s no different from the Black actors of Hollywood. There’s no reason why all of the black talent should *have* to compete for the role of Bishop or Storm, which I’ve discussed, while Joe Schmo can walk up and audition for literally anybody he wants.

Jharrel Jerome is 23 and has an Emmy to his name. He needs to be in the MCU in some capacity, period. Stephan James is another. How bout Damson Idris. Ashton Sanders. But no, no, let’s fancast Dacre Montgomery or Ansel or Joe Keery again as [Human Torch, Wolverine, Iceman, Angel, I’ve literally seen it all.]

6. Nobody wants to see the B-team if it comes down to it. The next line of defense from your racebending naysayers after “That’s the way it’s always been!” is “Well, what about Psylocke, Bishop, Forge and Jubilee?” who are otherwise known as B-tier X-Men. The problem is, we’ve got limited time and limited spots.

So since the X-Men is all about wonky metaphors that make half sense, let me give you another: Let’s say somebody approaches you and says “Hey buddy, I got two free concert tickets for ya! You can either see Michael Jackson Sings the Blues, or you can go see Justin Timberlake. Free of charge!”

Now, are you used to MJ singing the blues? No! Do you have a problem with going to see Justin Timberlake? No, he’s fine on a Wednesday! He had that one little diddy we liked that one time. We’d love to see him eventually! But are you gonna say, “fuck that, I’m going to see MJ Sings the Blues” regardless? Hell yes, because that’s still Michael Jackson. He’s gonna give the same amazing performance he always does, it’s just gonna be the blues. And speaking of blues...

7. Black is not Blue, Brown is not Blue: Raise your hand if you’ve ever heard this one: “I don’t care if you’re black, white, purple, or green, I’m going to treat you all the same!” I will not say all have this intention, but some fancasters have noticed that the racial diversity is kinda low within the A-List X-Men, so they oh-so-generously give the following roles to a black or brown person: Iceman, Nightcrawler, Beast.

Notice the pattern? It’s a microaggression, and it’s bullshit. What these fancasters are implicitly telling you is that, yes the actors will be black or brown, but when the action starts we can ignore that. They’ll be blue by then. In other words, you in fact do care if they’re purple or green. Nobody will cry foul if Dev Patel gets to play Nightcrawler (because that’s a common one I see), but should Anna Diop be Starfire or Michael B. Jordan be Human Torch, I bet there’d be backlash. Oh wait. If that’s you, please stop acting like you actually value diversity. You don’t want to see black or brown skin, period. Unless of course, it’s Storm (refer to point #1).

But wait, there’s more! When brown characters get whitewashed in these movies, it’s crickets! So eventually it’s revealed implicitly that proclaimers of point #4 only care about it one way.

8. Professor X should not be black if you’re not willing to change anyone else: The next line of defense is that some people say the professor should be black, if anybody HAS to be racebent. Something something MLK Jr., Civil Rights or some shit. Number one, I’m not reducing Professor X to being a magical negro for 9 white people (and Storm!) who for all intents and purposes get to have all the action. Number 2, the Professor X/MLK/Magneto/Malcolm X comparison is an oversimplifying disservice to ALL FOUR of those people. I hate that line whenever I see it, please watch a documentary my friends.

9. The Candidates for Racebending: For me, the A-List X-Men are Cyclops, Jean Grey, Iceman, Angel, Beast, Wolverine, Storm, Gambit, Rogue, Colossus, Nightcrawler, and Kitty Pryde. Now, who should be exempt from the racebending? Storm, she’s our designated minority. Gambit, he’s Cajun and they’re white (generally speaking, that’s a fun bit of research). Wolverine, Colossus, and Nightcrawler, because their nationality/ethnicity was the whole point of the Giant-Size premise in the first place. Angel, because his character embodies a privileged white male. Beast and Iceman, I don’t care one way or another (Point #7).

That leaves Cyclops, Rogue, Jean Grey, and Kitty Pryde. Now Jean Grey is a redhead, and we all know that every time a redhead is racebent people sharpen their pitchforks (Mary Jane, Wally West, Iris West), so I will cede the ground on Jean if only so that my ginger friends can get their rep. Kitty Pryde is Jewish, but Jews of color exist. Rogue is from the South. And Cyclops is, well, just Cyclops. That makes those three characters good options for more diversity. But allow me to make the case for Cyclops, specifically.

10. It’s not just diversity for diversity’s sake: If you had to pick who the main character of the X-Men is supposed to be, most would say Cyclops. And so in a series that highlights racial discrimination in society, it makes sense that our main character be black. While changing Cyclops’ skin color should not change who he is as a character, it *should* recontextualize it. Now, as an eventual increasingly radical leader of the X-Men, Cyclops would evoke real life figures such as Colin Kaepernick or, shall I say, Martin Luther King, Jr.

Not that most X-Men fans and writers truly think about what it means to be black anyways. Storm’s minority status is almost always put through the lens of her being a mutant and not her being a black woman. In other words, you can’t argue that making a character black will fundamentally change his or her character when you haven’t even analyzed the racial context of the black character(s) you already have. Another concept that the MCU X-Men should tackle: intersectionality.

11. Representation matters: I have to say it: Chadwick Boseman’s Black Panther hit different. And now he is tragically gone. At the end of the day, the MCU moving forward is down its most prominent black male superhero. Which has implications beyond just the movies themselves.

The women are in good hands. Shuri, Okoye, and Nakia are badasses in Wakanda, Valkyrie is ruling Asgard, Storm is almost assuredly on the way, RiRi Williams has already been cast, and Monica Rambeau is here and she’s not even at her most glorious yet. That doesn’t even include variable Δ, or the number of characters who can and will be racebent. And I’ll note again that to me, Gamora doesn’t count, because she’s green (#7 really pisses me off because it’s so blatant. I hate it). Of course from a behind the camera perspective we love black women getting work.

The men are a completely different story. Imma just go out and say it, I can’t stand Falcon and War Machine [in the MCU] because they’re not characters, they’re just two of a slew of MCU minority sidekicks who have essentially been at the beck and call of Captain America and Iron Man, respectively. You cannot tell Falcon’s story without mentioning Cap. The reverse is not true. There’s a whole essay that could be and have been written on “Minorities in the MCU, pre-Black Panther”. Remember, there’s a reason BP made so much noise in the first place.

So excluding those two we have, let’s see, M’Baku, Blade, and Fury who aren’t exactly the most superheroic superheroes, Eli Bradley is proooobably coming, I doubt Miles Morales is coming (because he’s just Peter Parker in the MCU), Luke Cage(?) Bishop(??), Sunspot(???), Blue Marvel(????). Not only are they not A-List, I would not put money on any of them being in the MCU any time soon.

Cyclops is thee Captain America of the X-Men. He’s the frontman. He’s the poster boy. He’s the “boy scout”, which in other words means he’s the hero, if there has to be one. It would mean a lot right now, and specifically *right now*, if he were to be black. The MCU needs it. It NEEDS it.

12. The X-Men is the Summers Story: I’ll even make the case that if just one character needs to racebent, then it should be Cyclops, because that of course implies that other related characters need to be black because half of the X-Men universe is in fact a part of the Summers family.

So now Cable is black. Corsair is black. Havok is black. And one of the most central stories in the X-Men mythos, the Summers family drama, is now a black family drama set in space or the future or where the fuck ever. The concept is boundary pushing. When white families have drama in the media, it gets to be Game of Thrones or Star Wars, while when black families have drama in the media, it has to be black people arguing in a kitchen or living room about their various earthly traumas (I’m @’ing you, Mr. Perry). I mean, that’s all fine and good often times, but I want my black family drama in space, dammit.

And again, this is the X-Men, the series that’s all about *minorities* and their struggle, so again, why not?

Oh, and I’ll even throw out a Havok fancast for you: How bout Jharrel Jerome?

#cyclops #scott summers #the mutants #monica rambeau #X-men #xmen #marvel #MCU #fancast #jharrel would actually be a better sunspot #but you get the point #my man would have OPTIONS

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repentantsky · 3 years

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6 Unpopular Gaming Opinions

I have a lot of unpopular opinions, and if you follow me on twitter, you might have seen a few recently. However, a simple tweet here and there hardly covers my opinions in gaming that might not sit well with people in this space. I know a lot of people get mad over differing opinions these days, but I have more unpopular than popular opinions, and I think I’d like to talk about a few.

6. If you’re mad about Pokemon games, you’re wrong

Yeah, I’m getting into it right away, and again if you follow me on twitter, you might have seen this once or twice recently, but getting mad about Pokemon to me, always seems foolish. Pokemon as a series has always been what we call a double A experience. Not quite an indie, but clearly not a AAA experience either. In other words, Pokemon is simple, and the crazy amount of Dexit hate, and other controversies about Sword and Shield, the most recent releases in the series are in my eyes, just plain stupid. It’d be one thing to be mad about something not being done if developers were in a similar situation as say, CDPR devs, but to our knowledge that’s not the case. Pokemon, fun as it is, isn’t that serious.

5. Western RPG’s are inferior to JRPG’s by default

There’s a simple reason for this. Games made with the western audience in mind, tend to have the same major flaw that a majority of western games do, they don’t explore the emotions of their male characters, espeically if the lead in a male character, half as well as Japanese RPG’s do. On the one hand, I get it, people still talk about FFXIII like the characters are bad, despite their “major flaws” in many people’s view in the west, simply being that they express their emotions openly. It’s a major problem in Western RPG’s though that the main character if male doesn’t show emotions, and that male characters that do, are seen as weak in the games themselves. This leaves female roles to carry all the emotional weight, which in turn pushes the male power fantasy too far in my opinion, and leaves the main characters boring. Many a western gaming fan would pick Geralt of Rivia as one of the best characters ever made, and while he does occasionally get to show some emotion, my pick would easily be more along the lines of Sora from Kingdom Hearts, or Rean Schwarzar from Trails of Cold Steel, because their emotions makes them more relatable and endearing.

4. Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity is better than Breath of the Wild

I’m of the opinion as it is, that Breath of the Wild is an overrated game. The climbing mechanics are frustrating, breaking weapons is annoying, and for all the world building and lore that Zelda has as a series, the story is a mess and can easily be told out of order. While Age of Calamity does tell an arguably less emotional story as characters fates are altered from Breath of the Wild, it also tells a more engaging one and characters being on screen longer than they were in the Breath of the Wild, also gives them more time to develop, and be characters we should care about. The Warriors format itself is pretty enjoyable as is, but combined with a story I was more invested in, characters I got to know better than Breath of the Wild ever tried to make them known, and just an overall superior representation of this version of Hyrule, it was simply just a better experience. I can only hope Breath of the Wild 2, ends up having that much story and that much fun gameplay to offer.

3. The Grand Theft Auto series, is kind of garbage

Now I’m really digging deep. The question is whether or not I’m just going off the rails, or digging my own grave. But seriously, these games are boring. The idea was novel at first when we finally San Andreas, be the bad guy, do whatever you want, all that. Sounds good, and it was kind of fun, but the problem is, GTA hasn’t really ever evolved past that. Sure it starts to look better, but the characters in it are stupid, annoying, and bland, games like GTA V don’t know when to end their main campaign, the series never really took the time to develop the few interesting characters it does have, like Franklin, because they just have to fall into the narrative of crime is good, and it’s just not a fun series because the controls aren’t great. You could do worse, sure, but you can also do better, and it doesn’t feel like Rockstar really wants to try. I’m sorry but the GTA games, are just boring and uninteresting after their novelty wears off.

2. Final Fantasy VII is just, okay, the remake is also pretty mid

To me personally, Final Fantasy VII is one of those games that really survives on nostalgia, and little else besides. Like, it’s a fine game, passable in the world of Final Fantasy as a whole, but some of it’s plots are not well handled or don’t seem to go anywhere, the ending kind of makes everything you do past a certain point completely moot, and Cloud’s pride is the cause potentially thousands of dead people because he didn’t back away when he knew he should have. Sadly, the remake doesn’t do much better. While it does give more detail to the story, and takes better care to make it make sense, it also is still pretty much the same story, and that’s boring to me. I’ve played this game, I know how it ends, (though possibly not in the remake) it just doesn’t grab me like it seems to have done for so many people. Even saying that, I still like the game a lot, because it’s Final Fantasy, and the series will always mean a lot to me, even the worst of it, but Final Fantasy VII, for me, is just okay, and the remake telling pretty much the same story again, doesn’t endear it to me.

1. The Last of us Part II, is fantastic

Yeah, something a little more recent to spice up this wild list, why not. The Last of Us Part II, is simply a fantastic game, with a well told story, fantastic characters, and great pacing. It doesn’t shy away from problems in our current society like sexual identity, it’s open to the fact that people are different than each other in ways that many people aren’t comfortable with, and it does it’s part to make open-minded people uncomfortable, by having them play as the woman that killed Joel. A lot of people who hate this game, seemingly can’t get past the fact that it does these things, and look at the game as it’s face value, which is sad, because if you’re willing to challenge yourself, you might find an amazing experience here. Yes, the gameplay isn’t the best, but just like the first game, the story is something far more in depth than anyone could have prepared for. It’s a masterful story, and a great send-off to Naughty Dog, who I personally cannot see myself supporting unless they change the way they develop games. Still, I admire what’s here, and what the developers did with what they were given.

And there’s some of my unpopular opinions, do you have any of your own? Let me know in the notes below, and share this if you feel so inclined. If you want to see more of my unpopular opinions, feel free to follow me on twitter @RepentantSky, since that came up twice, and have an excellent day.

#the last of us #the last of us part 2 #final fanatasy 7 #final fantasy 7 remake #gta #gtacommunity #gta5 #hyrule warriors #breath of the wild #JRPG #western #rpg #pokemon #nintendo switch #ps4 #ps5 #witcher 3 #cdpr #cyberpunk 2077

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inevitably-johnlocked · 4 years

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Hi Steph, hope you and your loved ones are doing well(: Do you have any long fics (+100k) that are about character development? I like casefics but I would like to read something that the focus in the story are the characters, even if there is some cases. I just read The Adventure of the Silver Scars for the first time and now I'm adrift lol. Thank you so much, you make my day most often than not, *virtual hug*.

Hi Nonny!!!

AHHHHHHH I’m so happy that you’re enjoying my fic lists, and that I make your day <3 I want to argue that I PERSONALLY find any story that long has a LOT of character development, so I’m gonna be an ass and add a part two to my last 100K w. fic list :) Hee hee hee! I don’t get a lot of opportunities hah. I haven’t read very many 100K fics since my first list last May so I apologize for the length.

Because I’m so focussed on trying to read more long fics lately, it’s taking me a lot longer to get through them, so I’m sorry I don’t have a lot for you. BUT I’m going to ALSO link you to my other longer fic list posts PLUS my case fic lists since you’re looking for those too :)

I genuinely feel like a lot of the fics I rec that are long have a lot of character development, because otherwise I don’t think I would have been able to get through them. It’s a weird quirk of mine: I need to get into the world of the characters if I’m going to invest that much time into them, so yeah :P I hope you enjoy what I have for you!

PS AGREED I loved Silver Scars! It’s actually on this list because I only recently read it, hahah :D

NOVEL LENGTH FICS: 100K+ W. Pt 2

See also:

Novel Length Fics: 50 to 100K (Nov. 2018)

Novel Length Fics: 50 to 100K Pt 2 (May 2020)

Novel Length Fics: 100K+ w. (May 2019)

Case Fics || [MOBILE]

Case Fics Pt 2

Case Fics Pt 3

Two Two One Bravo Baker by abundantlyqueer (E, 114,574 w., 27 Ch. || Military AU || Afghanistan, War Story, Thriller) – Captain John Watson of 40 Commando, the Royal Marines, is assigned to protect and assist Sherlock Holmes as he investigates what appears to be a simple war atrocity in Afghanistan. An intense attraction ignites between the two men as they uncover a conspiracy that threatens everything they’ve ever known, but Sherlock is as much hunted as hunter, and everyone close to him is in deadly danger. Can he solve the case in time to save himself and John? Part 1 of Two Two One Bravo Baker Universe

The Bang and the Clatter by earlgreytea68 (M, 137,049 w., 37 Ch. || PODFIC AVAILABLE || Baseball AU || Slow Burn / Dev. Rel., Possessive/Obsessive Sherlock, Jealous Sherlock, Mutual Pining, Body Appreciation, Depression, Closeted Sexuality, Family, Sherlock’s Mind Palace, Ogling Each Other, Anxious Sherlock, Panic Attack, Drunkenness, Talk of Forever, Big Feelings™) – Sherlock Holmes is a pitcher and John Watson is a catcher. No, no, no, it's a baseball AU. Part 1 of Baseball

The Adventure of the Silver Scars by tangledblue (NR [M], 142,458 w., 41 Ch. || S3 Fix-It, Post-HLV/ Post-TAB / Canon Compliant, Case Fic, No Baby, Angst, Humour, UST, Slow Burn, Angry John, Reconciliation, Not Nice Mary / Leaving Mary, Dependent Sherlock, Pining Sherlock, Caretaker John, Fist Fights, It’s An Experiment, Virgin Sherlock, Dancing, Drugging, John Whump, Pet Names, Sherlock’s Mind Palace, Scars) – It’s been thirteen months since Mary shot Sherlock and John finds he’s still pissed off about it. Sherlock had thought everything was settled: John and Mary, domestic bliss. But when John turns up at Baker Street with suitcases, the world’s only consulting detective might not be prepared for the consequences. A new case. Some old scores to settle. Certain danger. Concertos, waltzes, and whisky.

Against the Rest of the World by SilentAuror (E, 151,714 w., 20 Ch. || PODFIC AVAILABLE || Post-TRF, Hiatus Fic, POV First Person Sherlock, Present Tense, First Kiss/Time, Big Brother Mycroft, Escaping from Capture, Soft Sherlock, Toplock, Insecurity, Infidelity, Travelling, Introspection, Pining Sherlock, Depression, Fantasies, Yearning for the Past, PTSD Sherlock, Suicidal Ideation) – Sherlock has been away from London for nine hundred and twelve days and counting, and has no idea what sort of reception to expect when he finally returns.

Proving A Point by elldotsee & J_Baillier (E, 186,270 w., 28 Ch. || Me Before You Fusion || Medical Realism, Insecure John, Depression, Romance, Angst, POV John, Sherlock Whump, Serious Illness, Doctor John, Injury Recovery, Assisted Suicide, Sherlock’s Violin, Awkward Sexual Situations, Alcoholism, Drugs, Idiots in Love, Slow Burn, Body Image, Friends to Lovers, Hurt / Comfort, Pain, Big Brother Mycroft, Intimacy, Anxiety, PTSD, Family Issues, Psychological Trauma, John Whump, Case Fics, Loneliness, Pain) – Invalided home from Afghanistan, running out of funds and convinced that his surgical career is over, John Watson accepts a mysterious job offer to provide care and companionship for a disabled person. Little does he know how much hangs in the balance of his performance as he settles into his new life at Musgrave Court.

Free Falling by twistedthicket1 (M, 203,574 w., 38 Ch. || Guardian Angels AU || Guardian Angel John, Fluff and Angst, Humour, Kidlock / Teenlock, Light Mystrade, Passage of Time, Possessive John, Drug Use / Overdose, Victor Trevor, Graphic Bullying, Big Brother Mycroft, Hard Drug Use, Depression, Possessive Sherlock, Possessive John, Panic Attacks, Nightmares/PTSD, Pining, Healing Abilities, Kidnapping, Violence, Torture, Blow Jobs, Virgin John, Emotional Development / Attachment, Mortality, Happy Ending) – All Guardian angels are born with a Chosen human. When this child is born, the angel comes into being to protect and care for them during their life on Earth. For John Watson, all he cares about in the world revolves around his Chosen, Sherlock Holmes. Watching him grow up though, the angel soon learns that God must have had a sense of humour the day he decided to make Sherlock, as trouble seems to follow him like a magnet wherever he goes. John can't decide what's worse, the idea of losing his Chosen one, or the fact that he may be breaking the most taboo law of heaven as he disguises himself as a human to better protect and befriend the beloved detective he's always watched from afar. He was meant to care for him. But what happens when caring evolves into something more? What happens when an emotion an angel is supposed to be incapable of possessing comes to life suddenly and viciously inside John's chest?

#steph replies #johnlock fic recs #long fics #my fic recs #Anonymous #100k words #fic rec wednesday

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lizabethehampton · 3 years

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so i’m writing a book

and i saw a writing tip where you write a scene from each characters point of view to get to know them a bit better. i think it’s kind of cringe but my friends like it so here’s a scene i wrote for my favorite side character sibling duo :)

“Carissa, darling, you need to calm down.”

I was simply minding my own business, I was. Tanwen was hungry, and despite my orders to her handlers, they refused to feed her more. Something about typical dragon diets, etc etc. I argued with them about how Tanwen isn’t a typical dragon- not the sort from the northern mountains beyond Collis that they’re used to dealing with -and that she needs more to eat. But, of course, dragon handlers are stubborn fools, so here I was, sneaking into the kitchen to steal some raw meat for my mare.

It wasn’t my fault I heard Prince Devlin calling after my sister, piquing my interest. And when I saw her storm down the hall past the kitchen doors, the boyishly handsome Devlin Ryoko struggling to keep up, I just had to know what the fuss was about.

Conveniently, a lovely looking servant girl happened to walk by, so I flashed her a charming smile and said, “Sorry to interrupt your day, but do you mind doing me a favor?”

“Anything, Your Highness.” She curtsied.

I handed her the brown sack of meat I’d stolen. “Walk around, and to the first pair of guards you see I’d like you to give them this sack. Tell them it’s for Tanwen. They’ll know what to do with it. Thanks!”

I winked at her before whirling around and dashing after my sister and her prince, not giving the girl a chance to respond.

I found the two stalking down the shadowy corridor that led to the training hall where the guards usually honed their skills to the point of lethality. No surprise that Carissa would run here when she was upset. I knew of her late night adventures throwing knives at various targets once all the guards had returned to their posts or beds. I also knew that she hit the bullseye every time.

I stayed a well enough distance from them to go unnoticed but still within earshot.

“If you tell me to calm down one more time, Devlin,” Carissa snarled. “I’ll cut out your tongue and make sure you never tell anyone anything ever again.”

Devlin paused for a moment as if her threat had actually frightened him. Then he chuckled with amusement, continuing after her. “Very cute, Carissa. But you need to relax. It wasn’t that serious, and it’s not like they said anything wrong. I’m not even sure why you’re upset.”

My sister whirled on him. “Not like they said anything wrong? Not like they said anything wrong? They disrespected the servants, they disrespected me, and they disrespected females in general.”

“You’re being dramatic, Carissa. You need to stop this or rumors will start going around.”

She let out a harsh, breathy laugh. A sound I knew was dangerous from years of growing up with her.

“You’re just like them.” Carissa scowled.

“Oh, really. And what are they like?”

“Entitled, incompetent, selfish, sexist, and downright embarrassing to be associated with!”

I had to stifle my laugh to avoid being detected but I couldn’t stop the wolfish grin. That’s my sister.

“How dare you! I’m going to be your husband, and you dare talk to me that way!”

“I’ll talk to you however I like. Let me remind you, Prince Devlin Ryoko, that until we are married- which is a long way off -I outrank you. Therefore, I can do what I will. In fact, I could kill you and say it was self defense after you attacked me with that foolish cane you carry around and everyone would believe me because I’m just weak, young, darling little Princess Carissa who couldn’t hurt a fly.”

Her intense glare was in conflict with her sickly sweet sarcastic tone. If Devlin was smart, he would walk away and leave her be until she cooled down. But he wasn’t, and instead he laughed. He laughed at her.

Carissa shook her head in annoyance, turning once again and taking the last few steps to the training room doors. She pushed through them and stalked inside. Devlin, struggling to compose himself after his fit of laughter, followed her.

So I trailed after them, not bothering to hide. Stealth was now the least of my concerns. Especially now that I was debating whether to high-five my little sister or pummel Devlin. Possibly both. Nodding to guards I recognized as friends, my feet carried me into a brisk walk to keep up with Devlin and Carissa.

I heard the prince say, “Carissa, where are you going? This is no place for a lady.”

“In that case, good thing I'm a princess and not a lady.” Carissa said dryly.

She came to a stop at the small shooting range in the far corner of the training room. I finally made my presence known.

“Young Prince Devlin, surprised to find you here.” I clapped a hand on his shoulder a bit more harshly than one usually would, smirking once I saw him grimace. “And Carissa, my baby sister. Found a new target to practice on, have you?”

She grinned wickedly at me as she picked up one of the firearms off the wall next to me. “Yes, brother. Darling Dev here was happy to volunteer.”

“What?” A nervous chortle escaped the boy’s lips.

I chuckled, winking at Carissa. “Have fun. Don’t spill too much of his blood, please. It’ll be such a hassle to explain to King Laden why his son is rather...discolored.”

Devlin let out an uncomfortable sound from deep in his throat.

With one last grin, I turned away and moved toward the staircase that led up to the balcony area. It wrapped around the whole training room so that any interested in watching the guards train could at their will. Usually, it was filled with various ladies who were visiting the palace for whatever ball or luncheon was occurring that week; ladies who wanted to get a good view of the more handsome guards during their free time. Now, though, it was relatively empty.

The captain, a close friend of mine, was already there, overseeing the training of the newer guards. Arrow Tatsuya, a good looking man appearing to be no older than a mortal 30 year old. He was good at his job, protecting the royal family of Koilada with his life. He had fought many battles with my uncle and my father centuries before I was even born. I respected him. He looked after me and Carissa, too, so we were never really rid of him. He was always around every corner, never far from us.

“Arrow,” I nodded at him and leaned against the railing. His greeting was hardly more than a grunt, but he was never one to be particularly friendly.

Upon noticing Carissa at the shooting range, Arrow turned his attention from his men to the princess. We watched Devlin try to tell Carissa to put the gun down, that she was going to hurt herself, or worse, someone else. His words, not mine.

We watched Carissa roll her eyes and load the pistol, then, without warning, pull the trigger 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, times. She refilled and fired again. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10. The resounding booms echoed through the training room and silenced everything.

Everyone turned to watch as the princess lowered her arm, then turned to the prince next to her.

“The next time you decide to piss me off,” Carissa said with deadly calm. “Think about this moment.”

Then she dropped the gun into the case on the floor and sauntered out of the training hall. This time, Devlin was smart enough not to follow.

The silence was broken by the sound of dozens of feet shuffling over to the shooting range. Someone brought forward the target Carissa had fired at and the crowd erupted into murmurs and gasps and whispers.

Every shot, straight through the bullseye. Not one an inch away from the center.

It seemed my little sister stayed true to the guards’ reports of her late night adventures. It also seemed that the world was in for a rude awakening. Turns out their weak, young, darling little Princess Carissa wasn’t weak or darling or little at all.

I let myself fade into the shadows, let their misty, cool essence carry me downstairs. And in a flourish of black smoke, I appeared before the crowd, a smoking bullet in hand. Warm to the touch, it was one of the bullets that had embedded itself into the steel wall behind the targets after Carissa had pulled the trigger.

Tossing it up into the air and catching it again, I grinned at the crowd. “Gentlemen. I think you’ll find my sister is a lot more than she seems.”

And then I stepped forward, the crowd parting for me.

Just before I exited the doors, I turned around to look up at the balcony area where Arrow still stood. There, on his face, was a rare smile. I smiled back, saluted him, and walked out the doors. They didn’t close behind me fast enough for me to miss the, “Stop gawking and get back to work!” the captain shouted at his men.

I chuckled, walking the halls and stuffing the warm bullet in my pocket.

When I turned the corner out of the corridor, Carissa was standing there waiting for me.

“I can hardly believe I did that.” She said, pushing up off the wall.

I smiled, swinging my arm around her shoulders and pulling her close. “I can.”

My sister laughed and together we walked to the aerie where we found two terrified guards struggling to get close enough to Tanwen to feed her meat from a brown sack.

so yeah um...that’s it lol. thanks for reading!! let me know if you liked it <3

#teenwriter #fantasy #oc #wip #writer #writing #mywriting #character building #princess #prince #brotherandsister #siblings #siblingduo #my characters #writing a novel

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plaidbooks · 3 years

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Helping Others - an EDL Bonus

A/N: This is the second bonus chapter for Everyone Deserves Love. This takes place in the middle of chapter 12, but can be read before it. Just a date night that doesn’t end as planned...in the words of Rafael Barba, “no means no.”

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Tags: implications of smut, mentions of panic attacks, the briefest implication of child abuse (blink and you miss it)

Words: 2k+

Taglist: @the-baby-bookworm @beccabarba @thatesqcrush @itsjustmyfantasyroom @stardust-fray @averyhotchner @permanentlydizzy @mrsrafaelbarba @dianilaws

Devon walked down the hallway towards Barba’s front door. Their original plan was to spend last night together, into the morning, then Devon would leave to get ready for a fancy dinner that Barba had set up. They had been dating for four months now, but this would be their first real, public date, his work gala not included. They disclosed their relationship a couple weeks ago—well, Barba told McCoy; Jenkins didn’t really care, as long as it didn’t interfere with Devon’s work—and this was their first day that they were both off work. Most of their “dates” had consisted of either takeout, or Barba cooking an amazing meal, and them chilling at one of their homes, cuddling on the couch, watching whatever was on tv. Or the rare occasion when they went for a stroll in the Park. Both of them were slightly annoyed at not spending much time together. But they were not annoyed at each other. Never at each other.

Devon smiled as she made it to his door, using her key to unlock it and slip inside. Barba had mentioned coming to pick her up at her place, but she didn’t want to wait. We hardly see each other as it is; why deprave ourselves of even more time? she reasoned to herself. She closed the door silently, listening for where her boyfriend may be. She heard the faint sound of water. Shower still? We’re going to be late…she thought, shaking her head; Barba really could take forever getting ready. But wait a moment, she froze, hearing something else, barely audible over the water.

No way, she thought, sneaking down the hallway as best as she could in heels. Thank god for carpeted floors. She slowly opened his bedroom door, creeping in, trying to force her ears to listen harder. Sure enough, being this close to the bathroom, she could hear him clearly now; Rafael Barba was singing. In the shower.

She grinned, not in a teasing way, as if she caught him doing something embarrassing. Quite the opposite; he sounded…good. Better than good. She was actually shocked at how amazing his voice sounded. She felt her heart soften, her very soul melting as she fell more and more in love with him with every raise of his voice. Almost in a trance, she moved to his bed, perching herself on the edge, and listened.

Devon heard the water turn off, but his voice didn’t lessen. She couldn’t place the song; probably something from one of his theater plays he loved so much. Barba’s voice was muffled briefly—Devon assumed he was wiping his face with a towel—before he continued. The doorknob between the bathroom and bedroom finally twisted, door swinging open. Barba came strolling into the room, towel hanging off his hips, chest still slightly damp, voice still booming. That is, until he saw Devon sitting on the bed, smiling dreamily at him.

He jumped, swearing rapidly in Spanish, before saying, “god dammit Dev! What are you doing here?” He was panting and clutching his chest; it was such an animated response, Devon had trouble not laughing at him.

“I missed you,” she replied innocently, sticking out her bottom lip.

Barba regained his composure, moving to his closet to find clothes to change into, his face turning beat red. “We literally saw each other two hours ago.”

“That was two whole hours ago!” she whined. “Besides, forget that; why have you never told me you could sing like that?”

He dropped his hands to his side, refusing to look at her. “You must promise me that you’ll tell no one about that, okay?”

Devon was stunned at how serious, how sad he sounded. She got up from the bed, moving to lean against his side, uncaring that he was still damp, wrapping her arms around his bare waist, resting her chin on his shoulder. “But Rafi, you’re so good. Why hide that?”

He sighed heavily, turning to look Devon in the eyes. This close, their breath mingled, and Devon thought for the millionth time about how pretty his green eyes were up close. “Because, Hermosa,” he breathed. “That’s all behind me. A path closed off when I was a child. I…I don’t really want to talk about it right now, so can we just drop it? Please?”

“Of course,” Devon murmured back, kissing his shoulder. Questions still buzzed around in her mind, but she squashed them down; he’ll tell her when he wanted to. If he wanted to. And she’d be ready when that day was. “Now hurry up and get ready—you take forever.” She ran her nails over his back teasingly as she pulled away to wait by the bed again, and she saw him straighten, eyes darkening slightly.

“Do that again, and we’re going to be late,” he practically growled. He looked at her, eyes raking over every inch of her body; Devon was in a simple black dress, hem resting just above her knee, neckline plunging low, and hair swept up, exposing the soft skin of her neck.

She winked at him. “Take any longer, and we’re going to be late as it is. Besides, I like the idea of seeing you riled up all night. I feel like it may be worth my while to wait until after dinner.”

Barba chuckled, picking out one of his “fancy” suits, one that he swears is different than his court suits and his weekend suits, even if Devon thinks they look the same. “Fine, have it your way,” he said, voice dropping an octave. “But know that two can play this game.”

She could already feel warmth travelling south. Oh, she knew he was a master at this game, knew that he would most likely win it, too. But that didn’t mean she was going to go easy on him. She laughed lightly, heading to the door. She smirked when she heard Barba groan; he had just found out that her dress was backless, scars on proud display as well as exposing the back of her bra. From the wisps of black lace and hint of red roses that he could see, he knew that she was wearing his favorite pair of lingerie.

*************************

Amazingly, they made they dinner reservations on time. Barba wasted no time in making his first move; as they exited the cab, he placed his hand on the small of Devon’s back, his warm touch shooting electricity through her. The rough pad of his thumb rubbed circles into her soft skin. This is going to be a long dinner, Devon thought, trying not to think about what else that hand was capable of doing. They entered the restaurant, the hostess leading them to a secluded table. It was lovely; a short vase with two roses were in the middle of the table, a candle lit next to them. The table was next to a window, giving them a view of a small park, couples walking through, huddled together. Barba pulled out Devon’s chair, then scooted her in when she sat, before seating himself. He chose an expensive wine from the wine list, then poured her a glass after the waiter dropped it off.

Devon knew that Barba loved doing this; he loved treating her, giving her things that he thought she deserved. Even if Devon was content with curling up on the couch with popcorn and watching a shitty movie. But he indulged in her ideas of “dates,” so she would indulge in his. Her only real problem was navigating the menu; everything on it seemed 1) too pricey and 2) too rich a palette for her…delicate tongue—the fanciest cuisine she had eaten before was when she put her Chinese takeout on a real, ceramic plate. She went with the safest option she saw on there; some sort of pasta in a reduction of something or other.

“It’s nice going out on a real date for once,” Barba commented after the waiter had taken their order and left them alone once more. He reached under the table, hand brushing against her knee, pushing her dress up slightly.

“I’d agree with you, but with how handsy you are tonight, it seems like you would’ve liked to stay in more,” Devon grinned back, covering his hand with hers and squeezing. He turned his hand over, clasping hers.

“We always stay in. Maybe I want to show you off.”

Devon raised her eyebrows in mock offense. “Oh? And who are you showing me off to, if I may ask?”

Barba smirked back. “Why, all of New York, of course.”

Food came and went, Devon and Barba talking about work things—no one was close enough to hear any of it—before switching to other, more mundane topics. At some point, Barba’s hand had resumed its spot on her knee, the pad of his thumb rubbing soft circles in the skin.

“God, you are beautiful,” Barba murmured over the low-burning candle. He moved his hand higher, fingertips brushing over the skin of her inner thigh.

Devon gasped, eyes fluttering for a moment. “Rafi,” she breathed out. He chuckled low when he felt her spread her legs a little more under the table. Right then, the waiter came up; thank god for long tablecloths.

“Would either of you be interested in dessert?” the man asked. Barba looked to Devon expectantly, but from the lust evident in his eyes, she knew his answer. You’re dessert, he practically screamed with his eyes.

“I’m good, thank you,” Devon said, smiling politely to the waiter. Before the waiter could respond, Devon’s phone went off. She glanced at it before answering “Motely.”

The waiter passed the bill to Barba, thanking them for coming in tonight, and left. Barba looked at Devon, who was looking concerned while listening to whoever was on the other end of the line.

“I thought we agreed no work things tonight?” Barba whispered to her in a huff.

“Hold on a moment,” Devon said before covering the receiver. “I know, baby; I’m sorry. I need to take this. I’ll be right outside, okay?” Barba nodded solemnly. She returned the phone to her ear. “I’m still here.” Devon stood and made her way out of the restaurant.

Barba paid the tab, then decided to give Devon some time, just in case she was still on the phone, so he went to the restroom before making his way outside. He searched the front until he saw Devon, standing a little way away from the entrance, leaning against the wall and talking in a hushed voice on the phone.

“—no, really, it’s totally fine that you called me; I’m actually glad you did! You can always call me. No, yeah, that’s why I gave you my number. Never be afraid to call me, okay? And if I don’t answer, just leave a message, and I’ll call you back as soon as I can. I promise…. No, you’re not bothering me, it’s fine, really. Are you sure you’re feeling better? Okay…okay good. Yeah, yeah I want you to call her tomorrow, okay? I’ll check in with you tomorrow. Okay, bye,” Devon hung up and leaned her head back against the wall behind her.

“Everything okay?” Barba asked, concerned.

She sighed, shaking her head slowly. “I hope so.” She stood up straight. “I’m sorry, I know we said no work things, but that was…an old victim, from an old case. She was in a child sex trafficking ring that I helped break. She was 11 when I found her; she must be 17 now. But, she has really bad anxiety and depression. She has a therapist, but she called her twice and couldn’t get a hold of her and she was having a panic attack and she still has my number so she called me and so I had to talk her down and—”

Barba wrapped his arms around her, pulling her flush against his chest. “It’s okay. I understand,” he whispered against her head, placing small kisses there. All the annoyance he had felt left him as he held her, focusing instead on how pure his girlfriend’s heart was, at how much she genuinely cared. He stroked the back of her neck with his long fingers, releasing some of the stress built up there. They stood like that for a few moments, Barba gently rocking them back and forth until Devon’s sobs stopped.

“This was supposed to be a night for us, and then I ruined it,” Devon mumbled into his chest.

“No, Cariño. You didn’t ruin anything. You help people; that’s what you do,” he murmured back. She pulled herself impossibly closer to him. God, did she love this man…and hate her work. Sometimes. Only sometimes. “Come on, let’s get you home.”

He led her to the street, waving down a cab. Once in the backseat, Devon voiced the other concern that was in the back of her mind. “I’m…uh, I’m sorry, Rafa, but I don’t think I’m going to want to, uh, do anything tonight. I…it was a really bad case…the things they did to that girl….”

“It’s fine, Hermosa. You never need an excuse with me. In our line of work, especially, you should know that ‘no’ is perfectly fine with me,” he put a hand on her knee, squeezing it lightly. Devon leaned into him, resting her head against his chest while he stroked her hair, whispering how much he loved her.

#rafael barba x oc #law and order svu #law and order svu fanfic #everyone derserves love #edl bonus #fanfic #my writing

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wildlyminiaturesandwich · 4 years

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🏠 Tiny Living Stuff Pack Review 🏠

Thank you to the EA Game Changer Program for providing me with the opportunity to play with Tiny Living Stuff early!

I didn’t have a lot of time to play around with this pack because I had some real life obligations during the early access time frame and the embargo time was once again at a ridiculous hour of the morning for me (don’t get me started on that mess), but here’s what I did learn about the new Tiny Living Stuff Pack.

I feel like I need to say straight away that this is my favourite stuff pack so far. The reason I feel the need to say that is because when I sat down to go through the notes I’d made during early access and type up this review, the more I got into it, the more it started to sound... aggressively ranty 😬

I was going to try to tone it down a bit, but honestly there are already so many reviews out there that gloss over the glaring bugs that I figured I might as well just leave it. It’s my honest opinion of the pack, and what’s the point of doing a review if I’m not giving my honest opinion, no matter how ranty? lol

I’m gonna put this under a cut, because spoilers.

— What I loved —

🏠 Create-a-Sim:

I’ve been saying for a long time we need more comfy casual clothing for our sims and with this pack we finally got some! LOOK AT THOSE JAMMIES!

To be honest, I wasn’t expecting any CAS items with this pack, but we got some amazing clothing that I will no doubt use on literally every sim I make lol

The hairs are good too, and more options are always appreciated, however I honestly feel like we already have different variations of most of them.

The best part about the hairs is that every single one of them has been made available for kids and toddlers! Apparently one of the gurus found a quick and cost effective way to convert hairs, so hopefully we’ll see this happen more and more with each future pack!

🏠 Buy Mode:

The Buy Mode objects are 100% the star of this pack for me. I don’t think there is a single thing in the buy catalogue of this pack that I didn’t absolutely adore! Some of the objects have issues — and I’ll get into that in a bit — but overall I love, love, LOVE the general concept of everything.

[click for larger]

The objects in this pack were based off the Scandinavian concept of Hygge and I really think they hit the nail on the head! Everything feels so cozy and comfy, with a little hint of Ikea to the furniture and I just... I can’t even really put into words how much I love it all. I honestly can’t remember a single previous pack (expansion, game or stuff) where I have loved every item in the buy catalogue, there’s usually always something that’s like “Meh” or “I don’t like this at all” to me, but the objects in this pack are 10/10.

I also love that they combined so many things. Like the murphy bed with the couch on the front (though I do wish we were also given that couch as a separate couch as well) and the TV unit that’s also a bookcase AND a stereo. And I really appreciate that they went back and redid some of the old book ends to make them functional bookcases.

— What I didn’t love —

🏠 Create-A-Sim:

I say it with every pack and I’m going to continue to say it even if no one is listening...

WHERE ARE THE KIDS, TODDLERS AND ELDERS CAS ITEMS!?

I know the kids and toddlers got some hairs but that doesn’t make up for the serious lack of CAS content that every age range besides young adults has and it’s getting really hard to make unique sims when there isn’t enough content to choose from.

🏠 Build Mode:

For a pack dedicated to Tiny Living, I was really disappointed to see literally only one door in the build catalogue. ONE. I was expecting some small windows, maybe some sliding doors, but nope; just one door. Hell I would have even been happy to have less CAS stuff in exchange for some build stuff!

I get why they haven’t added bunk beds and spiral stairs yet, those are a lot of work and I’m ok with waiting until they perfect them BUT this would have been the perfect pack to add ladders. We already have ladders in game that are fully animated (pool and island living ladders) it really wouldn’t take that much work to make ladders work between floors. I HATE the idea of having to put stairs outside in tiny builds and ladders are the ultimate in space saving “technology"; I feel like the team really dropped the ball on that one.

🏠 Murphy Beds:

Listen, I love the concept of the murphy beds and the design of them looks really cool but I can’t see myself using them at all as they are currently.

I was almost immediately disappointed with them when I realised they were remote controlled. I know that it makes it easier for the Sims Team so they don’t have to work so hard to animate them, but I really wanted sims to pull them down by hand. The reason I wanted murphy beds in the game was because they would fit better with small apartments and homes of sims who don’t have a lot of money, and to me a remote controlled murphy bed sounds incredibly expensive.

Oh but don’t worry, because apparently the remote control is invisible?

Now, the version of the game that the Gurus were using for the stream didn’t have invisible remotes BUT they use a dev build of the game that isn’t the same as ours, and many other Game Changers are also saying its invisible for them too, so I dunno what happened but that’s just one of the things that needs to be fixed.

The other issue, which is the biggest deal breaker for me, is that the damn things constantly break! And I do mean CONSTANTLY. You know how when you buy a cheap stereo or sink it’ll last a few days/uses before it breaks? Yeh, not the case for the murphy beds. They break instantly, and they break often.

I was REALLY looking forward to murphy beds being added to the game and I thought if there’s one thing I need to do above all else with this pack, it’s test out those glorious murphy beds! Well... I managed to play for roughly three sim days and here’s what happened during that time:

Bed 1 (never used before) got stuck on first use and squashed Sim 1

Bed 1 got stuck on second attempt and killed Sim 1

Bed 1 got stuck on third attempt and squashed Sim 2

Bought brand new bed

Bed 2 pulled down without issue for Sim 2

Bed 2 broke at 11pm while Sim 2 was sleeping and squashed Sim 2

Sim 2 refused to sleep for 3 hours out of fear while Sim 3 was able to sleep in broken, sparking bed for that time without issue because they weren’t in it when it squashed Sim 2

Sim 2 repaired bed while Sim 3 continued to sleep

After 3 hours Sim 2 went back to sleep and Bed 2 broke again almost immediately

Bought brand new bed. Again.

Bed 3 got stuck on first attempt and squashed Sim 2

Bed 3 got stuck on second attempt and squashed Sim 3

Bed 3 pulled down without issue on third attempt for Sim 3

Sims 2 and 3 slept for another 2 hours before Bed 3 started sparking again but didn’t squash them

Woke Sim 2 up to repair bed and immediately sent Sim 2 back to bed (the fear moodlet only happens if they get squashed but the bed can break without squashing them apparently?)

Bed 3 broke again 3.5 hours later and squashed both Sim 2 and 3

I rage quit.

For the so-called “Hero” object of this pack, this is just unacceptable. The percentage for breakage REALLY needs to be turned down because in my opinion they’re not usable as they are.

And even if it weren’t for all the bugs, I probably still wouldn’t use them in tiny homes because I don’t think they’re space saving at all. They take up exactly the same amount of space as normal beds do; 6 tiles. You can’t put anything in front of them or around them if you want them to be functional on both sides, and you can’t even put dangling lights above them because I guess, realistically, the bed would hit them on the way down?

It’s especially annoying with the murphy bed that has the couch attached. It would have been really nice to add a small coffee table or ottoman in front of it but you can’t because then your sims won’t be able to use the bed. I really wish they had have made at least the little round coffee table and the ottoman from this pack inventory-able. Sims could have them out during the day, and throw them in their inventory when they need to use the bed at night, then place them back down in the morning when they wake up.

I think it’s this aspect — not being able to put things around/in front of the murphy beds — that actually annoys the most; the bugs will probably be fixed eventually but I can’t see this ever changing. I spent most of the three days we had for early access trying to work out how to fit a murphy bed into a 32 tile micro home without having it just sitting in the middle of an empty room and let me tell you, it’s not worth the frustration.

— The Verdict —

🏠 7/10 Would go Tiny again

As I said, this is my favourite stuff pack so far and I will get a lot of use out of the CAS and Buy stuff, but because of all the things I mentioned above I can’t give it a 10/10.

I do love the content of this pack, but right now I’m getting kind of fed up with the issues that keep happening with every pack lately. It’s all stuff that should have been caught by QA testing, stuff that is glaringly obvious to the average player, and stuff that would have only taken two minutes of gameplay to find out was a problem. I don’t know who tests these packs, but whoever it is needs to step up their game in a big way.

Overall I really do love the pack, but some major aspects fell a little flat for me. And the fact that that’s not at all a surprise, and that this feeling of “I like it, but...” has become the norm with new packs is really quite sad.

If you have questions about Tiny Living Stuff, feel free to drop an ask in my box, anon will be on right up until the release 😊

#The Sims 4 #Sims 4 #TS4 #Tiny Living #EAGameChangers

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lokiarsene · 4 years

Text

Goro Akechi Confidant - Rank 8 (ENG.)

breathes heavily in “enemy lovers romance dynamic appreciation” glee

y’all i’m not fucking kidding when i say this is a the love confession rank. i am NOT.

Note: I unfortunately lost my notes where I translated some of the alternate answers at the end of this scene. If anyone has the script or screenshots of those answers, please send them to me!

Goro’s Text: Are you free? I have something important to tell you.

Ren’s Text: I’m on my way.

Goro’s Text: Thank you. I’ll wait for you in Kichijoji.

If you do not answer his text and go to Kichijoji:

Goro: Good evening, Ren. I was waiting for you. There’s something I’d like to discuss with you, if you have the time? I’d prefer it if we went to a place without other people. How about Mementos? We don’t want anyone to disturb us.

(Ren travels to Kichijoji)

Goro: I’m all prepared... All I can do is wait for the day we send the calling card (lit., “wait for the notice day.”).

Goro: Hah... why is my heart pounding like this? That’s unusual for a detective...

Goro: I have something to tell you. Do you have time to talk? I’d prefer if we go to a place without other people... How about Mementos? ... We don’t want anyone to disturb us.

Mona: You two will go to Mementos alone? ... Well, it should be all right since you two can take care of yourselves... I’m not sure what’s going on here, but be ready for anything.

Ren: Let’s go.

Goro: Then let’s go to Shibuya.

(Screen fades to black. Fades back in, Ren and Goro are in Mementos alone.)

Goro: This spot should do just fine.

Ren: Answer #1: What did you want to say? (lit., Speak.) Answer #2: Why did we come to Mementos? (lit., Why to Mementos?)

Goro: For this.

(Goro turns around, takes out a gun. He’s holding it in his left hand.)

Goro: Don’t you remember what I said? If you beat me when I use my right hand, then I’ll become your true opponent.

Note: The word he uses for opponent is literally the same word for “companion/partner”--相手。See what I mean when I said love confession and that these two are all about layered meanings?

Ren: Answer #1: You mean in billiards? Answer #2: So you want a fight? Answer #3: What’s the point of this?

Goro: I truly do regret this... But it is your fault. (lit., absolutely insufficient/regrettable.)

Goro: You saw through me when I switched hands, you're quick and resourceful (lit., quick-wit/perceptive/clever), and above all, you can adapt and change (lit., growth potential)... You exceeded all of my expectations. And so I’ve decided: I want to have a true competition with you. (lit., I want to compete with you for real/true.)

Ren: Answer #1: I understand. Answer #2: Let’s go.

(Note: The verb he uses here is the same way he responded to almost all of Goro’s previous texts to go out (付き合う). The implication is that they’re truly going to “see/meet/go somewhere” with each other. And again, this is the same verb that, depending on the context, you can use to say you’re dating/going steady with someone).

Goro: Thank you for indulging me. Don’t hold anything back.

Goro: Let’s begin!

Note: He actually yells 来い! here, which, if you know your animu or Yakuza games, basically is a command to “come [over here]”. I could not for the life of me think of either a non snooty or a non ridiculous way to say it in English (”HAVE AT YOU” or “COME AT ME, BRO”) so I had to adjust it a little. Also, here’s the cut in for y’all to enjoy:

(Boss battle begins.)

Goro: You can’t beat me if you don’t intend to kill me.

Goro: Don’t hold back; show me how serious you are.

(The fight progresses. When you do enough damage, Goro says:)

Goro: Ah yes--this is fun! (lit., How nice, interesting)

(When you get Goro’s health low enough to win the fight, he says:)

Goro: Hahaha! This is better than I expected!

(The fight ends.)

Goro: ... As one should expect from the leader of the Phantom Thieves... Have you truly surpassed me already?

Ren: Answer #1: Do you want to stop here? (lit., Take a break?) Answer #2: Is it that serious? Answer #3: Does that still bother you?

Goro’s Answer to #1: Never. But if we take it any further, we might do something we regret... (lit., hold nothing back).

Goro: I want to keep going, but we still have an important mission to complete. And until then, you and I are true partners.

Note: He uses the words 大切な仲間, which when broken down means “important, beloved, dear, cherished, etc.” “colleague, partner.” Another alternate translation might be “you are an important part of my life.” I tried to go with the one that’s more subtle and layered, as that’s how Goro always talks to Ren.

Goro: ... We’ve done what we came to do. Let’s go back.

(Screen fades out. Screen fades back, and they’re standing outside in Shibuya, near one of the stairs leading to the subway.)

Goro: Once again, I understand more about you. (lit., I knew you today too.) As your teammate fighting at your side, I find your strength truly inspiring. To tell you the truth, I find myself even relying on it.

Ren:

Answer #1: I feel the same way. Answer #2: I rely on you too.

Goro: Is that so? That makes me happy.

Goro: Sorry I dragged you out with me today. I’m feeling a little better now.

(I feel like my relationship with Akechi has gotten deeper...)

Goro: ... By the way, about the fight we just had. Do you think you would have won if we continued to the very end?

Note: “the end” as in, if we fought to the death.

Ren: Answer #1: I wouldn’t lose. Answer #2: I don’t know. Answer #3: Maybe.

Goro’s Answer to #1: You would say that.

Goro: To be honest, I hate you.

Goro: The way you’ve stayed true despite everything, the way you work to surpass me, all the ways you’re nothing like me...everything about you is infuriating. If there’s one person I never want to lose to, it’s you.

Ren: Answer #1: I feel the same way about you. (Note: Another ambiguous line. This can be translated as “we are like each other”, “we like each other,” or “we feel the same way.”) Answer #2: I hate losing.

Goro’s Answer to #1: You really...? ... Well... that’s...

Goro: I accept that you were the winner, but next time, the victory will be mine. (lit., I will give you the win today, but next time I will win.)

Goro: ... And this is the proof of that.

(Goro takes the glove off his right hand, pulling on each finger, and throws it at Ren.)

(... It’s the glove Akechi usually wears.)

Goro: In the West, it is customary to challenge someone to a duel by throwing down your glove. If the opponent accepts the glove, then they agree to the duel.

Ren: Answer #1: I accept. Answer #2: I’ll have to think about it.

Goro’s Answer to #1: Don’t ever forget this: I will always be the one to beat you.

(Note: Alternate translation: “It is this me who will defeat you.”

Please note that he threw his right hand glove at Ren, instead of his “true” hand. Meaning that the “false” him will win, or that the one who will betray and kill Ren is not the real him [as in, once again he doesn’t want to kill Ren in order to win against him. This also means that since it’s not a “true” victory, Goro intends to have another competition against Ren in the future--basically promising that he will go for a rematch, which is what the glove represents. The ending of P5R confirms that it’s proof of their promise to each other.)

Goro: I think it’s best if we end it here for today.

---

So. The whole “dominant/true hand” thing here is obviously symbolic of both a card game and hidden truths. The card game stuff fits with P5′s penultimate boss theme (”Last ace in a lost hand”), as well as Sae’s Palace, the Casino, being the place where the betrayal happens. It also ties into one of the overarching themes of Goro and Ren’s Confidant, which is what they have between them is like a game (a meta choice on the devs’ part, as they are literally in a game).

Right from the start, Ren knew that Goro wasn’t showing a true side/his “true” hand, and the game showed this as Ren noticing the smallest details about Goro from the moment they met. This did not escape Goro’s attention, which is why he gets so fixated on the whole “dominant hand” issue as well as how perceptive Ren is. This is also why he panics and gets frustrated with how much he shares with Ren. Ren already sees so much, and Goro can’t seem to help himself and reveals so much of himself whether he intends to or not.

So basically both boys knew the other one had a secret that they were not telling each other (playing in their “off hands” so to speak). “Dominant/true hand” here can also be symbolic just in a narrative sense for who has the upper-hand.

This is why this Rank goes the way it does. In this Rank, Goro pulls a gun on Ren and tells him that now, because of Ren, he is Ren’s true opponent. Which, yes, he is. But the wordplay with “opponent/partner” cannot be overlooked because it was deliberate. Because again, Goro and Ren and their relationship is never just one thing. So it being Ren’s “fault” is like... Yeah thanks you to I wanna fight you. Replace “fight” with the romantic or saucier word of your choosing.

#akeshu #shuake #persona 5 royal #p5r spoilers #persona 5 royal spoilers #meta #mod krist translates

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angelsfalling16 · 4 years

Text

Where Are You, Simon Snow?

Chapter 2 of 15

Masterpost with art

Read on ao3

Fic Summary: Simon Snow is the worst Chosen One who's ever been chosen.

Baz has been saying it for years, and that statement is made even more apparent by the fact that Simon hasn't even bothered to show up for eighth year. He may be a complete idiot, but that doesn't mean that Baz wanted him to disappear.

Faced with an uncertain future, a Visiting from his mother, and the worry of whether Simon may have been fatally injured over the summer, Baz isn't sure how he's going to pass eighth year. It's his last year at Watford, and he can't even enjoy it.

or, the one where Simon was kidnapped at the beginning of eighth year instead of Baz.

Word Count: 2329

A/N: I know I'm a day late with the update, but I started back at work this week, and I was too tired to get this posted last night. I think I might switch to updating on Saturday to give myself some more time and rest before posting.I hope you all like this chapter!

Thanks @scone-lover for beta-reading!! <3

***

Baz

Simon is not at breakfast the next morning. He isn’t in any of our classes either, and when he isn’t at tea or dinner, I begin to wonder if it is time yet to start worrying about him.

I mean, I’ve already been worrying, but now, it feels like it’s precedented.

Simon never misses the chance for food in the dining hall, and when he doesn’t show up for either lunch or dinner, I know for sure that he isn’t at Watford—and likely isn’t going to be here any time soon.

He has never shown up to school late. Sure, he’s shown up looking tattered and worse for the wear, but that’s because apparently wherever the Mage sends him off to during the summer, he is treated as a weapon or a pawn, rather than a person who needs food and sleep.

You would think that if he were going to claim Simon as his heir and as the prophesied Chosen One, the Mage would make sure that he is well taken care of. Even if he is just using him. A weak weapon is of no use to him. He should want to keep him as strong as possible.

But maybe the Mage doesn’t care about that. He obviously just wants someone he can use to do his dirty work for him, and he doesn’t care at all for Simon’s well-being.

It’s a wonder that Simon still does what the Mage asks of him. The way the Mage treats him should make Simon hate him as much as I do, but for some reason, Simon sees him as a hero or something, someone to be revered.

If that were true, the Mage wouldn’t be working so hard to destroy the Families rather than focusing on the damage that the Humdrum continues to do to our world.

It’s no use trying to find reason within the Mage’s actions, though. All it does is get me worked up with nowhere to channel my anger. (Especially without Simon here to pick a fight with.)

Simon’s name gets called in class, and when there’s no response, everyone looks around with varying expressions of surprise and confusion before the teacher moves on to the next name as if Simon’s absence is no big deal.

This happens in Greek, Political Science, and the other classes that we share.

I’m the only one who seems concerned by his absence. The most anyone else seems is surprised, as if Simon is a nobody, and for some reason, that starts to get to me until I’m walking around for the rest of the day in a mood.

I stab my fork into my food at dinner, scowling down at my untouched plate of food and wondering how many plates Simon would have scarfed down by now. We always have roast beef on the first day back, and it’s Simon’s favorite. He would hate to miss out on this, so, where is he?

When I toss down my fork, abandoning the idea of eating, I find that Dev and Niall have been watching me for a while, and they almost look…concerned.

I know that they are not worried about Simon the way that I am, so it has to be something else.

“Are you alright, Baz?” Niall asks with an unusual softness to his tone. “You seem a little distant and not yourself.”

“How do you mean?” I ask.

“Well, you usually look a little livelier when you return to Watford.” I try not to laugh at that. I am sure that I have never looked ‘lively,’ what with being a vampire and all. “The term just began today,” he continues. “You can’t already be worn down by studying, so…did something happen at home?”

I hate that my friends know me well enough to notice such a small change in me. I didn’t think that they were all that observant. They usually take more interest in each other than they do in me. I must have been more lost in my thoughts than I thought.

The question about something going on at home is what really gets me, though, but I decide not to ask him to elaborate.

“Nothing is going on. I’m fine.”

The look they exchange with each other tells me that they obviously don’t believe me, but there is no way that I am going to tell them what has got me so lost inside my head today.

“We can tell when you’re lying,” Dev says.

“I’m fine,” I repeat, standing up to go before they can push the issue any further. “I’m just tired. I’ll feel better in the morning. See you tomorrow.”

Maybe Simon will be here in the morning, I’m hoping as I head up to our empty room.

Though, I’m starting to lose hope that he will return at all.

***

I’m not surprised when Simon doesn’t make an appearance the next day. (Though, I won’t say that I’m not disappointed by it.)

Dev and Niall don’t ask any more questions, but I can tell that they’re still curious. I try not to find myself in any serious conversations with them. I don’t want to have to worry about t how worried I am about Simon spilling out of me because I cannot have them finding out the truth.

If they knew how much I truly cared for Simon, they would never forgive me for everything that I have put them through. They would never understand that I’m too in love with Simon to act normally around him.

Just when I think that I am in the clear for the day, I run into Bunce on my way to dinner.

Rather than letting me pass by her, she blocks my way, placing her hands on her hips in an attempt to look more imposing. She’s got this dangerous glint in her eyes, and I know that it wouldn’t be a smart idea to mess with her right now, but before I can ask her if she needs something, she has already begun spewing an angry rant at me.

I suppose I never realized just how fierce Penelope Bunce is until this moment. I am pretty sure that she just threatened me in three different ways, and I’m still not sure why she is blocking my path.

Though, I have my suspicions. First, Dev and Niall, and now Bunce. I used to be great at schooling my emotions, but this whole thing with Simon has thrown me off.

Even when he isn’t here, he is adversely affecting my life. This is not giving me much hope for a future where he’s out of my life completely. (If we even make it that far.)

I’ve got several inches on Bunce, but her strong intensity makes up for her lack of height, and I almost take a step back to put some space between us.

Instead, I put on my signature sneer, one eyebrow raised, arms crossed over my chest in cold indifference, as I say, “What do you want, Bunce?”

“Simon.”

Don’t we all? I think, then regret it as my cheeks begin to burn. Bunce just continues to glare, oblivious to my internal thoughts.

“Where is he?”

“How should I know? You are his best friend.”

“And you are his terrible roommate. For all I know, you’ve got him hidden away somewhere, using him for your own devices.”

Only in my dreams.

Crowley, what is wrong with me?

“I haven’t seen your precious golden boy since the end of last term,” I say, with as much distaste as I can muster.

“You mean since we caught you holding hands with his girlfriend in the Wavering Wood.”

It isn’t a question, and I don’t respond to it. I would only incriminate myself, and Bunce is suspicious enough already.

“If I find out that you had anything to do with the fact that he is missing, I will make you regret it.” With one last piercing glare, she turns and marches away from me, her cape billowing behind her in the wind that her hurried pace creates.

There is no doubt in my mind that she is telling the truth about hurting me, but is Snow actually missing?

I mean, I know that he hasn’t shown up at school yet, but up until this point, I was still holding out a tiny bit of hope that he would walk into our room, sword in hand, and continue making my life absolutely miserable.

But if Bunce is worried about him, maybe he isn’t just taking an extended vacation. Maybe he’s in danger somewhere.

It seems impossible that Bunce and I would be the only ones who were worried if that were true, though.

Shouldn’t the entire World of Mages be up in arms over the disappearance of their beloved Chosen One?

Simon is like the sun, the center of the universe, so you would think people would notice that he just up and disappeared.

I know that if I were the one to disappear, no one outside of my family would notice if I were gone, but it should be different when it comes to Simon. All of these people pretend to care about him, yet they don’t seem to be the least bit affected by his absence.

It makes me irrationally angry to see how little everyone seems to care.

***

By the end of the week, the teachers have stopped calling Simon’s name. I get an uneasy feeling as I realize that no one is going to even try to do anything. I don’t know how they can do that when the world just doesn’t feel right without Simon here.

No matter what I’m doing, I can feel his absence, tearing through me like a virus, making me feel weak and out of sorts.

I’ve even begun to miss his presence at football practice. Somehow without him there to keep an eye on me, I’ve become a less than great player. I keep looking over to the stands to see if Simon is there. (He never even tried to hide the fact that he was watching me.) And more than once, I’ve missed it when one of my teammates attempted to pass me the ball.

They have all forgiven me so far, but I know it’s only because they would never be able to win any games without me, even though at this point, I’m no good to anyone.

The realization that no one is going to do anything about the fact that Simon is missing hits me slowly, but then it starts to overwhelm me, making it hard to breathe as I fall into a spiral of endless questioning.

What if Simon never comes back? What if I never see him again? What if he simply ran away? What if someone took him? What if someone hurt him? What if he was d–? No. I can’t think like that.

I have to believe that he is okay, that he is out there somewhere.

Wondering whether he could be hurt somewhere, waiting for someone to find him and rescue him, though, is what gives me the final push I need.

I’m not delusional. I know he won’t see me as a hero if I somehow find him. He won’t come rushing into my arms, thanking me for saving his life. Which is fine. I don’t care about any of that.

All I care about is making sure that Simon gets back to where he belongs. At Watford, finishing out his eighth year with the rest of us.

I don’t know how I’m going to find him, and I have no one to turn to. It’s obvious that Bunce doesn’t know any more about Simon’s whereabouts than I do, which means Wellbelove probably doesn’t either. She doesn’t seem too concerned about her boyfriend being missing either, which is interesting but not something I have the time to think about right now.

The Mage would be the most likely person to have information about Simon, but I would prefer to stay as far away from him as possible. And it’s not like the Mage is around for me to talk to even if I wanted to.

Some headmaster he is, never even at Watford.

I would think that Simon was somewhere with the Mage if I hadn’t been hearing about how the Mage and his men have been raiding the homes of the Families. If the Mage’s Heir had been tagging along with them, that definitely would have been mentioned at some point, so Simon can’t be with him.

Another thought I had was that the Mage could have sent Simon out with his own personal quest to complete, but that doesn’t seem all that likely either.

Simon is like an unpredictable bomb, best not to be left unattended.

Still, from what I can tell, the Mage doesn’t seem to be too concerned about Simon’s disappearance. That, or he knows that Simon is missing and is choosing to keep it a secret while he tries to locate him himself.

I’m sure that if the Families found out that he lost Simon, there would be all kinds of chaos. They would likely exploit the Mage’s weakness without him and plan some kind of attack.

I wouldn’t be too mad if they finally succeeded in bringing the Mage to his knees, but they might enlist my help, and I don’t have time for that right now. I need to find Simon and make sure that he is safe.

Either way, I can’t trust the Mage to find Simon. I have to do something on my own. It’s probably best not to leave Simon’s well being up to the Mage’s incompetency.

I am going to have to take matters into my own hands and search for Simon myself.

I don’t know where I’m going to start, but I won’t give up until I find him.

#snowbaz #snowbaz fic #simon snow #baz pitch #carry on #wayward son #rainbow rowell #snowbaz fanfiction #carry on fanfiction #my writing #cobb 2020 #my cobb

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mocha-sim · 4 years

Text

For a while now I’ve wanted to write out a post concerning where I stand on the whole issue with YanSim and its developer (in short: neutral, leaning heavily towards the negative side, but I like the potential of the story and characters). There are a lot of problems and I really want to throw in my two cents

This might not be necessary, but I need to get it off my chest, and hopefully make some people think about other points of view

Warning: long post ahead

1. Six years and still in development

I can really see both sides here

On one hand, six full years without even one rival - the single most important part of the game - and a game still full of placeholder assets, and terrible code on top of that, is pathetic

On the other hand, Yandev is working with only a small team of volunteers and himself, who (no matter what he claims) knows very little about game development (from what i’ve seen, he’s made one before, but it looks like a very small-scale and basic fighting game, unlike YanSim which is much more large-scale and has a lot of features)

Professional game teams do have full, high-quality games made in less than six years, but that time is also a product of game company employees being extremely overworked. Lately I’ve seen a lot more people talking about this issue, which is good, but isn’t it hypocritical to not also apply that logic to Yandev?

Again, though, I’m not sure how much time he spends actually working on the game - to me, it seems like he spends a lot of time on discord, reddit, etc. even if he does only stream for a few hours every night. Maybe the “harassment” that’s “slowing down game development” wouldn’t be such an issue if he didn’t spend so much time online interacting with these people?

2. The writing and characters

I’m not a huge fan of how the game’s story is handled, either

I don’t think it’s 100% fair to cast a final judgement with the game the way it is now - Osana not being out is in no way a good thing, but it also means that there hasn’t really been any opportunity for story or character development yet, especially for the rivals. That being said:

I feel like there’s a lot of wasted potential with characters’ individual stories and with the game’s story as a whole, like the “Aishi curse” - I just can’t think of many good stories with a main character who’s basically an empty husk. If Ayano had emotions from the beginning, and actually had to struggle with them, she could be a much more interesting character. There doesn’t even need to be a magical curse for it to run in the family - the way children are raised has a serious impact on the person they grow into. If Ayano is raised by a crazy, abusive stalker of a mother, she may well turn into the same thing.

Taro, too - he has so many contradicting character traits. He yells at Ayano for “scaring him” when she’s carrying a box cutter or laughing, but has the courage to run right up to a murderer and take off their mask?? He doesn’t care about reputations for Osoro or Oka, but won’t love Ayano if her reputation drops too low?? We’re told that he’s “friendly and respectful”, but we’re never shown that part of his personality. On top of that, we’re not really given a reason to like or pursue him as the goal of the game - when he’s not interacting with Girl of the Week, he doesn’t really do anything except sit by the fountain and read. I feel as though Taro should have a routine that involves interacting with other characters and gives us more of a feel for the personality we’re told he’s supposed to have

Raibaru as a whole makes no sense and feels like a satellite character to Osana. In Osana’s shoes, I would want to have a word with her about personal space. There’s not a lot to say about her aside from that, because... she doesn’t really do anything except follow Osana around all day and shut down the player’s attempts to kill her. She feels more like a soulless obstacle than a character

I think there should be more true pacifist options than just matchmaking - even the befriending elimination route will, in Yandev’s own words, involve someone getting hurt. If we’re supposed to have a choice on whether or not to hurt and kill people, there should be more variety in our options

3. The game’s code sucks/it’s poorly-optimized

Yeah.

I don’t know much about coding but the amount of awkward stretching/bending limbs on corpses, clipping through walls, low fps, etc. makes this obvious. It was definitely a bad move on Yandev’s part to start a project like this without at least taking a coding/game development class or something

I think the best course of action for Yandev would be to get a professional programmer on board after Osana is released and spend a few months fixing the game’s code before he starts work on the next rival

4. The character models are just stolen Unity models

They are just unity models, but not “stolen” at all - YanDev paid for them.

That being said, they’re sort of ugly and inexpressive, and personally i’m hoping they get replaced soon

5. The characters are all minors

They’re not. It’s in flashing red letters on the screen when you open the game. I can’t help but feel like the reason people keep insisting that the characters are minors is so that they can feel like heroes for defending them or something

It doesn’t make a lot of logical sense, but there’s still plenty of time for this to be fixed. I think it was recently confirmed that Akademi is called an “academy” now and won’t be referred to as a high school again

Imo YanDev should just change it to a post-secondary school, since that’s probably the most seamless way for all the characters to be adults

One last thing I want to say on this is that, when it gets brought up, I often see people use the excuse “the age of consent in Japan is 13″. 1: it isn’t - the Japanese government lets each prefecture decide its own age of consent, but 13 is the minimum. As far as I know, no prefecture has set it below 16. 2: even if 13 was the age of consent, that doesn’t mean we should accept and defend it as “part of a different culture”. It’s still pedophilia. 3: Japanese people actively protest against things like this

6. The uniforms are middle-school uniforms/don’t look like they belong in a prestigious school

Yeah

However there are multiple uniform options, and it looks like the default uniforms will be completely changed in the final game

7. Panty shots

YanSim is an 18+ game, but there is such a thing as too far

I’ve seen people who tolerate it, but I haven’t seen a single person who actively likes the panty shots and would complain if they were removed. Imo the part that makes this bad is the fact that we, the player, actively have to point our camera up a girl’s skirt and take a photo of her underwear with it being in full view; the whole way this works makes it obvious that the feature was put in there for titillation more than anything else, and it just feels uncomfortable. If it were more like Uekiya’s key-stealing minigame where all we have to do is push a few buttons, the whole gross/uncomfortable aspect could be taken away and a lot of people would probably be fine with it

It would also be better to replace it with an expanded version of the phone-stealing feature: this would let the player get “points” for students of both genders, plus it would still make sense to gain more points for certain students, like the student council or the bullies. Maybe you could even steal teachers’ phones under certain circumstances?

8. YanDev is homophobic

Again not too sure on this one

Iirc, most of the comments people bring up on this are from years ago when he still went by EvaXephon

But speaking as a wlw, I think some of the ways I’ve seen him talk about f/f relationships are pretty creepy. And on top of that, he seems to be considering adding a “female senpai” option to the game, but no male player character? (though i guess i can see the point of view that a male mc would need a lot more new voice lines, animations, etc. while the senpai follows a mostly fixed routine and would only need so many. still, it seems wrong to have one without the other). I hope I’m wrong about this but his support of the LGBT community seems mostly focused on the L and more for his own entertainment than any actual support

9. YanDev is making more money than he should (and handles it poorly)

His Patreon may be dropping, but his YouTube channel is raking in even more money with 2M+ subscribers, and he’s making even more money from things like merch and donations... all while apparently still living with his parents (which i don’t find hard to believe). He’s also apparently bought 2 switches and a sex doll instead of using the money to hire the help he desperately needs with his game

Assuming he really does still live with his parents, I fully support the petition to get his Patreon suspended until he at least finishes Osana. Most game devs don’t make any money off of their games until they’ve finished it completely

10. YanDev wrote rape fanfics

So I did briefly check his old ffn profile some time ago, and as far as I could see everything had the proper ratings and warnings

Tagging/warning/rating is a fanfic author’s only responsibility to you. You make the choice on whether or not to read it. If everything is appropriately tagged and you read it anyway, that’s on you, not the author. If you are mature enough to be on the internet unsupervised, then you are mature enough to curate your own experience.

Fiction is the place to explore controversial themes and topics. It doesn’t mean in any way that a content creator would condone the things they write about in real life

11. YanDev steals art/assets

He does, and still hasn’t apologized for the DLC rivals thing. In fact he made a post defending himself for it, and even compared himself to Andy Warhol in the process (lol)

I’m not sure but I think I heard something recently about him continuing to do this type of thing (the grass, etc.). In which case we should continue to put pressure on him until he credits the creators of whatever art/assets he stole. Art theft is inexcusable

12. The fanbase is mostly kids

This is unfortunately true, and it’s a big problem (i’ve had to deal with it myself on my youtube channel)

However I would personally say that this problem is outside of YanDev’s control. Kids seem to be drawn to edgy/violent things, or things they shouldn’t be allowed to see (just look at Call of Duty). I put the blame for this on the parents who aren’t monitoring their kids’ computer activities. As for YanDev, he’s not a babysitter and it’s not his responsibility to censor his content for kids who shouldn’t be viewing it in the first place

Underage or not though, he should really avoid calling his fans things like “fuck kittens”. Even from the perspective of an adult that’s super creepy to hear

13. The character designs suck

Some are alright, others are absolutely awful

I think that, in a game built on anime tropes, characters should be allowed to have unnaturally-coloured hair. I mean, a lot of characters in anime do have weird hair that you wouldn’t see in real life (seemingly without any dye), and it can add a lot of personality to their designs

But some YanSim characters push that too far. The science club is the worst of the worst imo, despite being otherwise one of my favourite clubs. The neon streaks are ugly, and what’s up with the visors? Why are they allowed to wear those outside of club time? Why do they wear them during club time, as opposed to actual goggles or something? (i have this issue with a lot of club accessories, imo the accessories are unnecessary in the first place)

The bullies and the light music club also take things too far. Their designs are crowded, hard to look at, and out-of-place. Nothing against characters with multi-coloured hair, but there’s a time and a place and a “prestigious” school setting isn’t it

(also, slightly off-topic, but why does almost every “intended couple” look like they could be siblings?)

I could probably make a whole separate post on the character designs in YS, but I’ll save that for another day. (i’m just very passionate about character design)

14. YanDev has collaborated with porn games 3 times now

Once I could overlook (after all, the characters are 18+ and YS is already not for kids) but a third time? Seriously? And so soon after the last one?

Not only do I have mixed feelings about Yandev doing crossovers when his game isn’t even in the demo stage yet, isn’t this game supposed to be taken seriously as a horror game? I can’t think of a single other horror game that has willingly put its characters in porn.

Also I can’t help noticing that he advertises the porn game crossovers a lot more than he did with that one Dark Deception crossover. Did he ever even mention that one? I only ever saw it on the Dark Deception Twitter

15. YanDev is rude to his fans

I don’t have a lot to say against this one. As far as I’ve seen, he is, and he doesn’t take criticism well at all (just look at the subreddit - yes, a lot of the things that were removed deserved it (unfunny cum chalice jokes, etc.) but there have also been completely innocent questions, fanarts, jokes, and fanfics that have been removed. Not to mention mods going through peoples’ post history and banning them for being active in r/Osana. Both he and his mod team seem insanely paranoid)

I think he’s going to have to grow a thicker skin and stop censoring critiques if he wants to get anywhere with this game. Not just fans who bring up tiny details that might need changing, but also big, glaring issues like the code and character designs and such. He also doesn’t seem that professional for a game developer who wants to be taken seriously

That being said, if you’re the type to spam the discord server/subreddit/fan communities who have nothing to do with Yandev like the amino, you deserved that ban

16. YanDev defends pedophiles/the “sex license” thing

“No adult ever has any excuse to do anything sexual with a child. As soon as you touch a kid, you have crossed the line from being someone with a mental disorder to being the worst scum imaginable. Having a mental illness is involuntary, but touching a kid is a choice. If you have a mental illness, I feel bad for you. If you violate a child, I feel disgust and contempt for you, and I think you deserve the death penalty.” -From YanDev himself on this page

The sex license thing is also debunked on the same page: the whole conversation was taken out of context and the hypothetical “license” was supposed to be something that only an adult could meet the requirements for

17. “Corona-chan”

This was a really insensitive move to make in the middle of a pandemic, and I agree that the design was racist

However, YanDev listened to the fans’ complaints and removed the easter egg a day later, plus gave an apology. I think that this was the best thing he could do in that scenario and idk what else people are expecting him to do about it

18. YanDev’s general portrayal of high schoolers

Honestly, it’s not 100% realistic (especially in some of the dialogue. you know what i’m talking about)

I’m surprised that more students don’t seem to have friends outside of their clubs. It seems like all the students mostly stick within their club/group - walking to school together, spending their breaks together, etc. A lot of the ways the characters behave are very robotic, like walking in a perfectly straight line everywhere they go

That being said, a lot of the things i’ve seen criticized in regards to this are not part of the problem. By the time you’re in high school, you’ve probably hit puberty. It doesn’t make a character automatically sexualized if they have bigger breasts (though some designs in the game are over-sexualized, like a few certain staff members)

19. Muja, Mida, and Hanako

Let’s start with Hanako: Yandev has already said that she’s not romantically interested in her brother, she’s just insanely clingy and doesn’t want him to get a girlfriend out of fear that he’ll forget about her. If you still insist that she’s in love with Taro, then that’s on you

Muja and Mida I have mixed feelings on.

If every student is 18 or older, meaning that the first-years are 18, that makes Taro, a third-year, 20-21 years old. If Mida and Muja are in their early 20s as Yandev has said, that means that the age gap isn’t an issue. However, it’s still wrong for a teacher or a nurse to pursue their student/patient

I don’t think Yandev should need to spell out “hey, Mida and Muja are not good people” in flashing neon signs. The game is rated M and anyone who’s old enough to play it should be able to understand that without it being said. If you need morality in fiction spoon-fed to you, you probably shouldn’t be watching/reading/playing anything rated above PG

On the other hand, YanDev has a nasty habit of making these things into a joke, which is really insensitive and creepy. Like saying that Mida’s favourite food is “the spit of a younger man” (yikes), that she’s tried to seduce her own students 69 times (haha 69 so funney right guys XD), or that whole confession scene mess. It’s less of a problem with Muja, but it’s still there. As much as the audience shouldn’t need everything served to them on a silver platter, issues like these should still be treated with respect, not made into gags

20. Yandev wastes time on “Easter eggs”

I have to agree that he does spend time implementing unnecessary things sometimes (like the abc challenge), but as far as I know the Easter eggs are what he does in his spare time while waiting for assets from volunteers. However: snap mode, which was hyped up for years, turned out to be a flop with zero purpose, disappointing a good portion of the fanbase.

21. Love Letter

So far I’m really liking the look of this game: I like the models and the school environment they’ve shown, and it seems like they’re doing a lot of things in better or more interesting ways than YanDev, like not outright telling us who the rivals are. I don’t think it’s fair to accuse them of “stealing” anything, when it seems like most of the assets the games have in common are the things they bought from the Unity store (Love Letter even changed the base Unity model to have a more appealing look)

I'm glad to see that they actually listened to criticism from fans on things like Setsuna’s design (I love her newest look and I hope it’s the final one). From design alone she’s already a more interesting protagonist, and she looks like the sort of character you’d actually enjoy playing as

Not sure I totally buy the claim that it was all done in two weeks, but even if it was over the span of months, that’s still miles better than YanSim’s six years

Knowing that Dr. Apeis has already ditched one project I’m staying open to new information on this, but as of right now I’m looking forward to playing the demo!

Overall: A lot of the hate against the game and the dev are unnecessary, but some is justified and we shouldn’t blindly defend everything he does (seriously, you can admit that the character designs are shit. no one is going to stone you for it). There are a lot of improvements Dev could make, both on the game and on his behaviour towards fans.

I think that the biggest improvement would be for the game to just stop taking itself so seriously. At this point, it’s so full of memes, cringy google translate names, excessive edginess, and gags that it may as well just be a fun ridiculous anime game instead of a serious horror game. I feel like taking this approach could make it more successful (plus, it doesn’t really have a lot of horror elements aside from the gore)

There are a lot of cases of people taking things too far. Like spamming YanDev with explicit gore/animal abuse, trying to swat him, spamming volunteers with weird porn, trying to hack into volunteers’ accounts (including bank accounts), etc. That is going way too far, no matter how awful or pathetic you think a person is. If you are doing these kinds of things, you are doing more harm than Dev or his volunteers

Attacking YanDev’s appearance is unnecessary and not related to his behaviour or skills. Same with the chalice memes

However, I’ve seen a lot of YanDev’s defenders lashing out against “gremlins”, lumping all of them in with the kinds of people who do these things. If you check r/Osana, you’ll see that most if not all of the people there condemn this behaviour: the gore and porn spammers are a loud minority (and i’m willing to bet most of them are the basement-dwelling losers from KiwiFarms and 4Chan)

Attacking and/or spamming fans who are just trying to enjoy the game is also unnecessary. Someone liking a video game you don’t like is not doing you any harm. Be mature and move on

I’m not sure if some of what I’ve said above is 100% accurate so if anyone actually read this and has evidence against it then feel free to add

I think that’s about all I have to say on that. Again, i don’t know if it will change anything in the fandom but i really just wanted to get this off my chest

#yandere simulator #yansim #yanderedev #yandev #not sure if i should tag this as crit or not

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jmsa1287 · 4 years

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Alex Garland's 'Devs,' on Hulu, is a Religious Experience

"Devs," the new conspiracy/neo-tech thriller from filmmaker Alex Garland, is an ambitious and accomplished new series and the best TV show of 2020 so far.

Alex Garland is the latest filmmaker to make the jump from the big screen to the small screen. Known for crafting brooding existential sci-fi horror stories like "Ex Machina" and "Annihilation," Garland doubles down with his first TV show, an eight-episode series called "Devs," which debuts its first two episodes on Hulu Thursday. (The show will mark FX on Hulu's first series, a partnership between the two companies which are now both owned by Disney; "Devs" will not air linearly on FX at all.) Just like his previous two films, Garland's "Devs" is a carefully paced story that is the British filmmaker's most sprawling work to date. On "Devs," a young woman named Lily (Sonoya Mizuno) and her serious boyfriend Sergei (Karl Glusman) work for a giant tech company in San Francisco called Amaya. Its CEO Forest (a major performance from Nick Offerman) is most interested in managing a top-secret arm of his company called Devs. No one knows what actually goes on there, but, after impressing Forest, Sergei is about to find out as he's offered a position.

FX and Hulu are smart to share the first two episodes for the show's debut. "Episode 1" introduces the show's mystery — a sudden and strange suicide — but "Episode 2" really kicks things off, pulling back the curtain just enough to show what the Devs department is working on and re-centering the show on Lily, who is on a path of decent into a wild neo-tech thriller and far-reaching conspiracy. Being set in San Fran, Garland captures the obsessive nature of Alfred Hitchcock's "Vertigo" as Lily digs deep and is constantly gaslit by Amaya's top staff, including Forest, his right-hand woman Katie (Alison Pill) and Kenton (Zach Grenier), the company's head of security. She has few people to turn to (her family lives in Hong Kong) but finds solace in her ex-boyfriend Jamie (Jin Ha), who is still not over the end of their relationship and is essentially a fascinating version Barbara Bel Geddes's Midge in "Vertigo." Garland, who writes and directs all eight episodes, takes a number of rewarding risks with "Devs," and is unafraid of making bold narrative choices that are truly shocking. When you think "Devs" is one thing, Garland zags, making you realize the show is going after something completely different and always keeping you on your toes. Talking in any less vague terms about the show would ruin the surprises "Devs" has to offer. The biggest critiques often throw at Garland are similar to those aimed at the British Netflix series "Black Mirror," an anthology series that shows us the worst sides of technology. Those who aren't fans of Garland usually argue that his films are surface-level intellectual that are only elevated by his slick and methodical filmmaking. "Devs," unfortunately, will not turn any haters into lovers as his TV show is unmistakably a Garland product, full of eerily beautiful imagery (that giant statue of a girl that looms over Amaya), a bonkers sci-fi technology that feels rooted in reality. The pacing here is purposefully slow and "Devs" is often restrained, which allows for dynamic moments to truly pop. Though Garland is smart about flipping some narrative expectations "Devs" does have a a few problems, most notably in Forest. Though casting Offerman was a smart decision (the actor is quite excellent in the role), the character of a misunderstood/damaged genius is an extremely boring trope. Also, transgender activist Janet Mock, who has proven herself as a writer and director on "Pose," makes her acting debut on "Devs" as Senator Laine. She's a natural, but her character is given so little to do that you wish her role was upped a bit. Also, Grenier, a long-time "that guy!" character actor, deserves a shout out as the ruthless Kenton, playing the security head as a Terminator-esque freak; a truly bone-chilling turn.

Like his previous films, Garland is interested in bridging science and human nature. "Ex Machina" looked at human relationships and technology. "Annihilation" felt like a futuristic climate change disaster flick that blended the organic with the unnatural. In more than eight hours, Garland is able to flesh out a fascinating world that seems tangible. "Devs" is a mediation on obsession and how those with power (especially in the technology industry) can bend the will of others — and reality — in order to get what it is that they want. Space, time, math and everything we know to be true can be thrown out the window if the wrong people in power have enough grit and determination. "Devs" is an abstract show grounded in a reality. It's completely gripping and singular to Garland's vision throughout its eight-episode run. It's equally as hypnotic as it is confounding and it is also the filmmaker's most emotional work, where he's able to spend time crafting relationships often not found in his movies, which feature isolated people. Garland's first TV show is indeed an impressive one and hopefully it won't be his last attempt at making something for the small screen as the TV format is quite suitable to his vision.

#tv #devs #fx #hulu #fx on hulu #alex garland #ex machina #annihilation #Sonoya Mizuno #nick offerman #Alfred Hitchcock #vertigo #black mirror #janet mock #alison pill

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edge-lorde · 4 years

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hp update: its been a long time, boys. ud think that with this plague outbreak id have more time for shitty phone games, and ud be right! however, the time i normally might use to make tumblr posts has been taken up by reading lotr orc fanfiction non-stop for at least 1 full month. id still be in the thick of that obsession even now if only the fics would update. that is how i find you today folks, for the first time in many weeks i am staring at a screen with nothing to do. so come with me friends, theres no better way to fill the soulless void we are all in than reading a nice long tumbler post.

disclaimer, first of all, a lot has happened, i prefer to keep these updates as plot spoiler free as possible but do to extenuating circumstances i feel like it is necessary to say, [SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER BELOW]

that rowan fucking died,

i wont say exactly how, but i will say that her death was animated as were animations of myself and a few others reacting to our friend fresh corpse. obviously meant to be serious moments but the animations made it seem almost comical.

i saw at least one post going around right after this update that was like ‘how could the game devs do this to us..... how could they hate rowan so.... this is punishment from on high’ and its like.... u guys do know what a story is right? the events of a story are not typically done to punish less faithful fans, im pretty sure they were planning to kill rowan off from the beginning. this isnt disney im pretty sure the writers are not writing each chapter the night before its released by popular vote.

that little “are we drifting away..?” scene with rowan makes more sense now. there was a bit in one of the scenes where the kids all reminisce on rowans life and the mc talks about it being the last real one on one time they had with rowan. a nice bitter sweet moment. i dont hate this turn of events. its a good reminder that actions have consequences and we are way past they days of “should i wear a hat or scarf?” its YA time now.

i did manage to take 1 screenshot from this time, i had commented that before that when rowan said she didnt have many friedns that barnaby seemed to be hanging out with her without be there as a friend buffer and here was his reaction to her death:

;_;

the funniest part in all of this however, was of course cedericks reaction to rowans death “but she was so young....” LOL fuckin RIP.

lets see... what else.... i forget a lot of what happened but i think there was a time sensitive quidditch event in there somewhere? if so i dont remember it. what i do remember of the quidditch pals is that im gonna play beater now, skye is being weird and cagey about it, andre is involved.... the others are there.....

sidenote, i love the shitty b characters they throw in to be like yes you know this person but no they are not cool enough for u to even think about befriending. the first one of those is face paint kid, and now we have another, who is a former beater girl with horrible bangs named bean who didnt go to any classes for a whole season so she could just play ball 24/7 and got kicked off the team. this is a character who only exists to provide an explanation as to why there would be a beater position open but i love them on principle.

right now im in the midst of another time sensitive event, this one is a bother-your-brother-at-work-day event where recent hogwarts graduate bill weasley is bullied by myself and his younger brother charlie into letting us go with him on one of his curse breaking jobs.

so for those unfamiliar, bill works for the magical bank of england.... and his job seems to be “retrieving treasure” for said bank. in the books, there is a bit where he takes his family on one of his trips to egypt, where his job seemed to have been tomb plundering indiana jones style for the posterity of the english bank :X. i wont explain here why thats bad but its bad.

the game devs however in this instance, at least SEEM to be doing what jkr couldnt do by attempting to salvage what is left of gringotts bank and form it into not a super shitty implications factory run by horrible jewish caricatures. bills mission is to retrieve a goblin made artifact that was taken by dragons, so no going to foreign countries to steal things from other people! only going to a dragon reserve to rifle through animal nests. they even appear to be providing us with a likable goblin character, egad!

my hope for this event is that we get a plotline about how maybe, goblins arent shifty human haters for no reason, and in fact they hate magic humans for very understandable reasons, like being forced to go into hiding with the rest of the magical world even though only the humans wanted to do that, and maybe despite running the bank in england they still dont have a lot of political sway in the world of wizards and witches, and have to rely on the faith that said wizards and witches wont fuck them over at every turn, even as they see how they treat other non-humans, such as house elves, which they desperately dont want to end up like. and maybe they DONT only care about gold... maybe thats a human stereotype based on the fact that theres a long history of humans not respecting goblin ownership customs.... which i could get into..... but i wont.... i just....... very badly dont want them to suck ;__________;

i know i said its ok to still like a piece of media as long as you recognize the problems with it, and i do, but once this game is done im gonna stop hp posting all together. ive been feeling more and more uncomfortable making these posts lately.

GENERAL GAME NOTES; theres been some new layout changes and such.

most notably the stairs screen has been changed from a bulleted list of all locations to a screen with tiles picturing an image of each location along with the name + icons of all classes at each place. there is one additional location that is new and yet to be unlocked, and the dragon reservation is appearing temporarily as its own tile as well. i prefer this method of getting in and out of a temporary location to how they did it with car during the last christmas special. the stairs icon also now stays in the corner when you scroll through locations, allowing you to open the stairs menu without scrolling all the way back to the left.

they also moved a few of the buttons down into the lower left corner rather than the left side & combined the story button and sidequest button. they added a little camera button as well, just like in the dormitory, that makes all the icons in a location disappear and look better for screenshots.

the daily special add offer thing now has its own button in the top right corner of the screen, and idk if i mentioned it before but now there are daily challenges that appear in the sidequest screen that offer small rewards for completing 3 tasks per day + a better one if u get all 3. the prizes are things like 4 energy, 75 coins, 3 monster food. the better rewards are usually either more coins, 8 energy, 3 gems, or 1 notebook. i think that it does all the different color notebooks but i cant remember for sure if i ever saw the gold one up as a reward. i like this addition in any case. if you dont pick up ur reward by the end of the day, the next time u log on it will force u to stop and accept them, and if one of the rewards is energy and ur energy bar is full, it does not seem to stack beyond the bar so watch out.

the character stats page is now more zoomed out so you can see your full character instead of just from the waist up. no change to the leaderboard. rowans face in the friendship roster is now a still black and white image that says ur friend may be gone but friendship is forever u-u.

rowan has been removed from all classes. in the classes where the minigames involved her, those minigames have passed the mantle onto other friends in the class. in potions that person is now liz helping u find stuff off the shelves and in tranfiguration that person is badeea. bless these girls for helping mc get through it. touched my heart.

theres been a few fun little “i know u have more free time now so uhhhh have some energy” prizes like they do sometimes when they dont update on schedule so thats been nice. just a few days ago they gifted us 3 gold notebooks the same way. :O.

theres also been a few instances of a energy happy hour where for a limited time energy takes less time to refresh. normally it takes 4 mins for 1 energy to do this but during happy hour its like 2:30 mins. :U its all very interesting.

and that will have to do it for tonight my friends, ill do a post for the dragon event when its done because i do like it so far and i do like getting to bully bill with charlie.

until next time, remember.......

#hp #harry potter #hphm #harry potter hogwarts mystery #bill weasley #goblins #charlie weasley #sirius business #rowan khanna #rambling #Thoughts #so sorry im still making these posts #i just want to see them through to the end now

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crasherfly · 3 years

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Weekly Update

It’s a privilege to write about personal shit this week.

There’s not much I can add to the conversation about the election, suffice to say it was both better and worse than expected, and I’m glad that society isn’t immediately collapsing, at least this week.

Which is to say I’ve never been so glad to focus on my stupid, deeply low-stakes life updates. Obviously, the future is still uncertain and there will be plenty of work to do in the days and years ahead, but a week ago, I wasn’t certain if I’d be witness to a reality where questions like “how did a week of not drinking go” and “what are you playing” still matter.

So without further ado...

It was a challenging week, obviously.

Not just the election- I’m talkin’ for like- EVERYTHING. Home life. Work life. Creative life. I could go on. You get the idea.

I went on full blown quarantine as of last Friday after learning a member of my household may have covid. You wouldn’t think it was much of a change from my normal every day, but man, I did not realize just how many little things were working together to keep my sanity together.

A short list- weekend walks to pick up morning coffee, Friday night carry-out sushi and pizza, my weekly groceries at the co-op, and most importantly- trips to the weight room- all suddenly off the table until testing results come in.

In my state, testing often requires booking at least 3 days in advance, and it can take another 3-4 days just to get results back. Luckily, everyone in my home works remotely, so this doesn’t put us out too bad. I can’t imagine now non-remote workers manage. Even so, having to toss all the precious little things I’d managed to keep despite the pandemic stung. I even had to put my wrestling watch parties on hold- they took place on Discord, but one of my friends would normally come over to watch.

I’ve worked through a lot of huffy anger and annoyance over the course of the past few days. Losing my ability to get to the gym as the weather turns especially hurts. As a weight lifter, I’m pretty reliant on what the gym offers. Early into the pandemic I got a lot of folks snidely telling me to go lift paint cans. I resisted the temptation to tell them they could in turn pay for my back surgery. Thanks to the pandemic I’ve learned that the gym is actually a need for me, emotionally and physically. Losing it, even for a week, feels awful. I can’t wait to get back to it.

Until then, jogging and biking will have to suffice.

One positive- I’ve gone a week without drinking!

Based on my tracking, that’s actually the longest I’ve since June, which is nuts.

Predictably, I have gained weight. Because no good deed goes unpunished.

I don’t know if I’d say I notice any life-changing effects yet. For all I know, my body is still adjusting to the sudden absence of all the shit it’s normally used to working in overdrive to break down.

A few things I’ve noticed- my runs are going slightly better, I can stay up later working on games or creative endeavors, and I’m actually experiencing REM cycles again- meaning I’m dreaming, and dreaming vividly. I also get incredibly hungry around 10:30 every night- because, surprise!- that’s when I’d normally sit down with a beer or glass of sake. So I’m working on finding ways around that.

I can’t say I’ve felt a huge urge to drink. I occasionally wonder when, or indeed if, I’ll grab a glass of beer again any time soon. But beyond that, it’s been pretty easy to lay off. The fatigue alone was just such a pain to work through, not to mention the way a glass of beer would just kinda pin me into place for the rest of the night. I like how active my brain is now in the late hours.

But I do watch a lot less anime now :(

On that note, here’s what I’ve been playing lately!

Outer Worlds (XBONE)

So, you probably missed it last post- probably ‘cuz I forgot to write about it in my first draft, but I wrote about my Total Kill Run that I just wrapped up in Outer Worlds.

The short and dirty version for those of you who can’t be bothered to go back and read- I tried to do a run where I killed every NPC in Outer Worlds, a space RPG from the Obsidian, and instead got sidetracked with completing the nefarious Board’s story and ended up doing a Board run instead.

I was surprised by how humor and wit the game brings to its commentary on your wanton slaughter. The devs were not bluffing when they said you could kill anyone and anything in Outer Wilds and they even prepared a few nice moments in anticipation that some players would try.

I was disappointed to find that the Board’s mission- and indeed, some of the progression points I followed on my own go-it-alone-and-kill-everything story, mirrored the Good Guy story beat-for-beat, basically shrugging and saying “well, you’re gonna do this anyway, like it or not”. At several given points you can kill everyone you like- but you’ll still have to find that keycard, access that terminal, or visit that far off map point now matter how hard you try to get out of it.

I was finally struck by how little I missed. I skipped A LOT of stuff- almost every sidequest and all the companion quests. And you know what? I had a fine time. I might even say I had a better time. So much time in Outer Wilds is devoted to fetching, traveling, and sitting in load screens. Turns out you do less of all of that when you just go guns blazing into every civilized map.

Some friends earlier this week were talking about revisiting old Bethesda-style RPGs like Fallout: New Vegas and Skyrim. It got me thinking about whether or not I would bother doing that myself any time soon. It’s true those are better games than Outer Worlds. But if the point of Outer Worlds is to echo those positive experiences so closely...what does my recent experience say about the source of that reflection?

Just a thought I’m chewing on. I don’t have a good answer. But feel free to HMU if you have your own thoughts!

NeoGeo Arcade Stick Pro- Art of Fighting, Samurai Shodown, Fatal Fury, World Heroes 2

Friday night I sat down at my desk, dimmed the lights and hooked up my NeoGeo Arcade Stick Pro. On my second monitor, I brought up move lists for King of Fighters ‘95 and started my fighting game learning journey.

I did OK, in my opinion. I stuck to just learning the hero team- Kyo, Daimon, and Benimaru. I even managed to trigger a few level 1 supers. I think I could safely beat the average player at an arcade now- but there’s definitely plenty of system I came nowhere close to learning all the ins and outs. However, after trying out a few subsequent KOF games, it seems like my learning should transfer forward.

I also tried out a few other games on the stick. Art of Fighting and Fatal Fury aren’t games I’ve had prior exposure to. In my experience, they seemed a little slower than KOF. The command lists were definitely shorter. Samurai Shodown was absolutely gorgeous and felt really, really good to play. I could see getting really into it.

My big highlight was World Heroes 2, which I ended up playing most of the night. It’s a bit sillier than the previously noted titles, but it has a really fun roster and a good, medium-sized move list that isn’t too taxing to remember. I had seen some of the characters, like Johnny Maximum, on the Spriteclub roster, so it was cool to see them in their native environment.

Overall, the Arcade Stick Pro is holding up nicely. The stick itself is solid, and the deck is a natural fit on my lap or desktop. I’m not noticing any serious input lag and the buttons seem really responsive. Of all my retro consoles, this might become one of my favorites.

Endless Space 2

AMPLITUDE’s 4x sci-fi has entered hallowed realms of my “Games I will Be Playing 20 Years From Now” list. A massive, sprawling turn-based strategy about managing a spacefaring empire, Endless Space 2 is great for those weeks where I want to play a 4X that I can resolve within 20 hours.

For my most recent run, I once again took up my favored faction, the Riftborn. Every game is a learning experience, so this time around I was determine to try and tackle the massive and deeply inconvenient quests that Endless Space 2 mercilessly slews at you every_damn_turn.

I was mostly successful. I didn’t finish my faction’s quest, but I did complete the Academy quests. Throughout every game the Academy looms as this impartial faction that hires out heroes and provides boons to those who donate resources to it. In the endgame, the Academy offers a quest that forces every active civilization to choose sides regardless of existing alliances. Depending on the results, the last phases of Endless Space 2 can look very different

I finished the questline, unlocked a cool cinematic and learned that next time I should definitely not ignore those quests, however obnoxious they might be. The faction buffs earned from successful completion are....pretty wild.

Sunless Skies

Another week, another dead captain in Sunless Skies. This captain had a particularly long run- I had managed about...15 hours with him before losing him to some enemies that I was not at all prepared to fight. Death comes quick in Sunless Skies- a single bad decision can lead to swift death.

This run I at least managed to bank a ton of valuable supplies and upgrade my engine. My next captain will have a better shot as a result. I’m not sure when I’ll pick the game back up. After a particularly long run I usually take a long break- weeks or even months. We’ll just see what happens.

Pokemon Shield

I’ve finally, FINALLY beaten the endgame of Pokemon Shield. At least, I think I have. I’m sure there’s a few more things to do here or there, but for the most part, I think I’m done. I beat the champion and saw the credits roll. There’s some DLC to visit and more ‘mon to catch, but mostly, I’m done.

I had the opportunity to take care of some trade evolutions and partake in a friendly battle with a friend. It was the first time I’ve done that since...I kid you not...the playground in 5th grade.

It was...really fun?

I’m a deeply casual pokemon player. I don’t search for shiny ‘mon or suss out perfect numbers. I just use who I think looks cool and I try to keep type and consideration in mind. As a result, my friend and I had to agree on some ground rules for average levels- but the result was a compelling match.

I found myself afterwards making plans for another battle night. This tends to happen in November- I get really into Pokemon again for a few weeks. Historically, this is ‘cuz I’m normally traveling a lot for the holidays. That won’t be true this year, but old habits die hard.

Maybe I’ll even bust out my 3DS again soon. Who knows?

Quest 2: Revisited

Last week, I posted some thoughts about the Oculus Quest 2. I’ve spent another week with the headset, testing some new features and trying some more involved experiences. I’m happy to report my thoughts on the machine are still positive.

If anything, my impressions are MORE positive than before. My eyes have grown used to the world of VR. I’ve found a setting on the out-of-box headstrap that I don’t hate. And I’m finding more experiences than I initially suspected I might.

I’ve had a change to run the Link option, for instance, which allows you to use your Quest 2 as a Rift. It’s actually pretty seamless, requiring only a good desktop and a USB cable. My cable seemed to suffer from some bad speeds, so my experience was pretty laggy, but with an approved cable, I have no doubt the Quest 2 could handle just about anything you throw at it.

I finished Superhot, and have only raving reviews to offer. It is a perfect introduction to all the Quest 2 can do. Given limited space, Superhot places you in do-or-die situations where you must dodge, duck and shoot your way through enemies. When you move- time movies- so you will often find yourself forced to take stock of your surroundings before making your next step.

It is sharp, offers a great mix of puzzle solving and brisk action, and even serves as an ad-hoc workout. Picking it up with your Quest 2 is a must.

Encouraged by Superhot, I gave Job Simulator a try. It is a zany VR experience that humorously simulates a number of white collar job environments. It is short, funny, and with no shortage of silly interactions. I spent several minutes in my digital office cube shooting staples into neighboring cubes and giggling at the angry responses of my co-workers. WHO THREW THAT. STAND UP.

Finally, I’ve taken some time to try and get into the streaming world beyond the Mozilla app. It has been both encouraging and...well, not so much. I’ve mostly been dinking around in Bigscreen, an app that offers a number of Pluto TV channels in digital theater environments. You log into a room with other people, who appear as avatars, and you all watch the shows together.

Well, sorta. Most people don’t really watch the shows so much as they throw digital tomatoes at the screen and shout upsetting shit at each other. The server population seems really low, so the massive theaters take on the quality of a creepy XXX cinema, where one always feels a bit apprehensive of who they might meet.

At its best, Bigscreen is genuinely funny. I’ve made nightly stops at the Star Trek theater, which plays old reruns of Next Generation. The most enjoyable moments come in the spirit of MST3K, with witty comments and memes as people throw digital refreshments at the screen. I’ve found myself giggling despite myself.

At its worst, Bigscreen is a deeply racist and sexist hideaway full of the types of folks you’d normally shush the hell out of in a real theater. You can mute people, but it’s a tedious task. A reporting function also exists, but who knows how or if its being enforced at all. Finally, unless you’re doing a film rental, you’re going to be subjected to commercials on everything from erectile pills to The Blaze. I’ve described it to others as being Peak Late Night Cable: The App. If that appeals to you, well, it’s there and it’s free.

I’ve tried streaming my desktop, both on Bigscreen and via Oculus Link. Both were very laggy. There’s a very popular desktop streaming app I could try, but it costs IRL money. Honestly, most of what I’d want out of my desktop streaming I already get from Mozilla.

I like the Quest 2 a lot. I hope we see more experiences tailored specifically to it, as opposed to through the Link function or via desktop streaming.

Dungeons and Dragons

I finally wrapped up my improv sessions with my local DND group. Having just finished The Lost Mines of Phandelver, I wanted to take some time between campaigns to improv and get off the grid a bit.

The result was 4 sessions, 2 hours each, where I had nothing prepared in advance and I let my players take the lead. I gave them a map I’d built of the region and told them we could go anywhere they like.

My party ended up splitting into two groups- one heading to Castle Grayhawk, and one to Neverwinter. Antics ensued, personal quests furthered, and by the end, everyone felt ready for our next adventure at the Salt Marshes.

An interesting takeaway- when doing improv sessions, I had almost zero fights. I never once broke out the battleboard and only a handful of attack rolls were even attempted.

I, personally, like combat a great deal. So I don’t think that will be my style forever. But it was interesting to see what my sessions could look like without it, especially after such a combat-heavy campaign.

Anime

I’ll be honest- I’ve fallen really behind on this season’s anime. I have so many hobbies, and one thing gets shoved aside for another, necessarily so. This time, it’s anime and manga. I promise I’ll get back on the horse soon.

As the year winds down, I’m already thinking about my experiences over the past year and what my end of the year experience list will look like.

I’ve seen so many amazing titles this year.

Like, I get deeply, viscerally emotional when I think about Re:Zero.

My heart races as I think of the thrilling high points of Tower of God.

I delight in my inner goth kid as I ruminate in experiences like Gleipnir and Berserk.

I’m going to have a lot to talk about. Just thinking about it motivates me to get out there and see more.

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