#Helpful Salad

[7grandmel]

Todays rip: 23/03/2024

Balcony Cruise

Season 4 Episode 2 Featured on: SiIvaGunner's Highest Quality Rips: Volume D

Ripped by Helpful Salad

Requested by an anonymous reader! (Request Form)

Hey, remember yesterday's post on Viva La LOWAS: the rip of a track quite prominently paying tribute to Cave Story? Well, the Cave Story love isn't ending quite yet, and if ripper Helpful Salad has anything to say about it, the game is going to continue showing up on the channel no matter what. Though today the focus is indeed specifically on Balcony Cruise, the guy's made a bevvy of Cave Story rips just as good as this one - 39 out of his 63 contributions, to be precise! - that I think are all well worth checking out.

Funny enough, there's unintentionally been a sort of running theme with the posts as of late starting with Poké Village. That theme being that, these are all rips I love despite them paying tribute to sources that I'm far too unfamiliar with, be that Monster Hunter, Homestuck, or in this case - FTL: Faster Than Light. And I'm able to love these rips because, as I've said many a time before, SiIvaGunner is as much about appreciating the things you already love as it is about being introduced to media that someone else loves far more. I know myself already that Cave Story's music is incredible, yet despite my endless playthroughs of the game I'm never going to grow tired of hearing all the many ways SiIvaGunner's rippers share their own affection for the soundtrack, not just in the Balcony Fusion Collab, but in the continued amount of rips the game receives to this day. There's emotion packed into efforts like Balcony Cruise, emotion that shows how Helpful Salad truly understands the Cave Story sound, that makes me thoroughly enjoy his rips with or without the needed context for whatever joke he's attaching to it.

And well, after hearing Balcony Cruise, I did feel the need to go listen to FTL's music as well - and indeed, it's just as incredible as I'd suspected! The solemn yet beautiful atmosphere of Balcony can be felt in much of FTL's whole soundtrack, befitting a game about surviving a cruise through space, and so Balcony Cruise being a melodyswap to the game's main theme feels like a natural fit. Yet...I can't shake the feeling that there's also more theming relevant to the rip beyond the shared atmosphere of the two games. Though FTL isn't exactly an "old" indie game in the same vein that Cave Story is, 2012 was still only two years removed from the release of Super Meat Boy, it was still quite early on in the indie game resurgence of Xbox Live. Cave Story is a landmark game for the indie world as a fully self-made release all the way back in 2004, made by one Daisuke Amaya in his free time out of a desire to express his love for games like Metroid and Castlevania into something playable. Eight years later, the spirit of indie gaming in the Independent Games Festival, the legacy shaped in large part by Amaya, was what directly inspired Matthew Davis and Justin Ma to pursue independent development full-on to create FTL.

What I'm saying is - mixing the two games together as Balcony Cruise does, two games that are on the surface completely disconnected, yet feel ever so connected at the same time...feels all too right. And if we REALLY want to go the extra mile: a rip as solemn and atmospheric as this, feels truly befitting of Quote's journey in the King for Another Day tournament from the year prior. Losing before truly getting to do anything, outdone by the big dogs, yet providing an unforgettable experience and giving us incredible arrangements like Lifelike Waterway. Months after the tournament finally ended, after so many SiIvaGunner viewers had grown yet more attached to Quote, and many were reminded of just how impactful Cave Story in general was...Balcony Cruise feels like the perfect tribute to the game. And more Cave Story is never something I'm going to turn down.

[tempo-takoyaki]

In honor of my "gege am i ugly" post getting over 10k notes, here's a "san lang am i ugly" version of it. Featuring: how I'm picturing Hua Cheng 90% of the time.

[vee-dmsr]

i wish alecto fucked gideon so she can be like ms earth i'm sorry i wasn't familiar with your game

[starcurtain]

Even leaving aside the obvious ship bait here, this is one of the best examples of character comedy Hoyo has posted in a long time.

The fact that Jade sends Aventurine a bunch of rocks just knowing that his incredible luck will allow him to suss out, without even cutting the stones, exactly which ones are worth processing is funny as hell.

The fact that Aventurine is actually able to answer and picks out the rocks that contain high value jade without hesitation is absolutely hilarious.

Bro is out here using his blessing from a goddess to play blind-box prize games. This is like finding out X-Men's Professor X uses his telepathy to order pizza.

Do you think people ever call Aventurine like "Hey man, is my new relationship going to work out?"

And Aventurine's just over here as the divination champion of Pier Point going "Signs point to no, friend. The vibes are just rancid. Abandon ship ASAP."

And then he trips over his catcake and eats shit because he didn't see it coming.

[sevastiel]

Assorted Gs Drifter Doodles, focus on comfort and rest.

Numbering for text, not necessarily order! Transcriptions below.

1- powerpoint reads, “You are a cat. (With proof)”

2- Teshin- “Drifter?”

Teshin- “…”

Teshin- “Rest well, warrior.”

Teshin’s thought bubble- “I shall not move until he wakes, the orokin could not bestow an honor as high as this. I accept my fate.”

3- eepy (arrows pointing to arthur and drifter

4- Aoi- “Watch *this*.” (Lettie goes “mm?”

Aoi, to drifter, “Mow!”

Drifter, in immediate return, “Miau!” (Amir pokes his head out and goes “Mew!”

Aggressive meow stimming ensues.

Box to lettie states, ‘Is trying to resist joining SO hard’, and box to Aoi states, ‘knows’

5- Lettie- “If you will not sleep, we shall raise this to a code black.”

Lettie- “Go, mi babas!”

Drifter- “Yes ma’am.”

[hustlebonezzz]

My disease, my infection I am so impure

Reptile - Nine Inch Nails

[gentlenotes-moved]

"why do i constantly feel so empty and why does life feel like a foggy haze and why does every emotion come with a heavy undertone of guilt"

babe you're self isolating again and you haven't talked to a single friend in 3+ months. you've been emotionally and mentally burnt out for several months (or years) and it's made even talking to the people you love feel like a burden, and your anxiety and depression ain't helping. and you're just so so scared your friends hate you for all of it. they don't, i promise.

[whysoblue2]

Well, time to show what's cooking!

The cover art for The Last Bishop, the First to Fall! I thought I would wait to show the finished product... but hell, lineart is my stronger suit, so before I ruin everything with clumsy colours, here it is with its own post! What do you think, guys? Finished piece here!

[boxofoxberry]

sorry guys i doomed the yuri AGAIN. UGH

[munchboxart]

I highly doubt I will be finishing these pieces, so I will share my final PruneSapphire(?) pieces. I wanted these to be like the Beast Yeast art covers where the Beasts and Ancients mirror each other, but I think I was a little too ambitious + already got tired of drawing these unfortunately. Sad I didn't finish Prune's though, his was really cute and probably my favorite composition

[lazylittledragon]

hi! I absolutely love your art and I get so happy when I see it come up on my feed! 🥰

if I can ask, why does cyra use a cane sometimes? I just saw your art where gale and cyra are with their newborn and cyra is walking with their toddler and she has a cane and I was curious.

have a good day! 😁💚

thank you so much!!!

i don't think i've said much about it other than 'she almost died' aksdhsh but everything went very wrong when the first one was born and she got sepsis, which can really fuck you up long term and she developed chronic fatigue.

she definitely tells the children that she's got a sword hidden inside it

[frogpols]

Yoshikage Kira’s everyday breakfast in practice.

There was an attempt (inspired by Cody).

[sov-est]

I’ve consumed an alarming amount of potatoes over the New Year’s celebration so I may be like 10% a potato right now. Can’t make myself to draw a finished piece so here, have boys being all happy and cozy.

Wishing everyone a happy new year, love you all

[housecow]

advise please

I eat fast food not too often, but enough to where I’m getting a bit bigger. My issue then becomes my stomach absolutely hating me and spend all morning in the bathroom. Then boom I’ve lost all the weight I put on.

How do I keep the weight on??

you don’t have to eat fast food to get bigger 🥺 figure out what foods your body is okay with, and learn to make them yourself!! it’s cheaper in the long run and you’ll feel better!!

fast food is *not necessary* to gain weight. you can gain weight by eating a shit ton of literally anything—i lived off of steak salads for a bit and gained weight bc ranch is fatty asf, lol!! nourish yourself and make sure you’re getting enough fiber!!!

[omg-snakes]

I was so, so lucky to meet a very special trio of snakes for a class I'm taking on methods in field ecology. One of my two professors is a specialist in garter snakes and was kind enough to bring three different species in for us to compare in person and observe up close. The first was the gorgeous common garter snake, Thamnophis sirtalis, pictures above. She was so calm and well-mannered!

Next was this tiny (by comparison) T. elegans dude, a western garter snake, who was wary of the camera but very patient about being passed around by a group of excited college students. He matched my classmate's sweater perfectly!

Finally, an endangered and incredibly precious T. gigas, the giant garter snake. She's about half of her maximum adult size, so a giant indeed! She musked and peed a bit but for the most part this gojira-faced beauty was pretty chill. We got to observe a full work-up for her including documenting records and microchipping.

She's one of the last of her species. Despite Herculean efforts by her protectors and conservation experts (mostly just one man and his dedicated team), this is a very difficult species to observe in the wild and their habitats are disappearing faster than their need for prioritization of protection in a given area can be assessed. These snakes rely on riparian habitat near rivers, which is also unfortunately a favorite for human development. At this time we don't know how exactly many giant garter snakes are left or whether their current populations are stable.

Today we got to visit their marshland habitat and watch these three go back to the place where they were caught. It was a huge honor and something I'll carry with me forever.

[zishuge]

The Spirealm 致命游戏 (2024) | Ep. 36