#Photon Token

[ygoartreviews]

Photon Token

I completely understand that this little orb is meant to be, you know, a photon, but I can't shake my initial impression that this is, in fact, a ball of ice. It's less the ball itself (although the spiky projections on the top and bottom could be mistaken for icicle-like protrusions), and more the jagged white shapes floating around it. They're probably meant to be swirls of energy, but they really do look more like weird floating hunks of ice. I am in love with the mystical looking background here, however.

Rating: 6/10, an orb for you to ponder

[cer-rata]

Slobo and Anita????

In 2025

SIGN

ME

UUUUPPPPPPPP

Slobo sniffed again. “You smell....ozone?”

“Nah, but I feel the photons--”

Bart winced at a bright burst of violet light, while Slobo didn’t react because, you know, blind. Then there was a loud, satisfying pop! and when the light faded, floating before them was the Star Sapphire they’d come to Gotham to see. Bart did appreciate how extra his outfit was, he looked like an anime anti-hero, or maybe the token guy with a weird other power thing going on in a magical girl show. He also sort of looked like Kon, actually. He was a little shorter, more slender, a touch Blacker even, but the vibe was pretty similar: Punk aesthetic, fancy, excessively cared-for hair, a smile that looked confident but screamed ‘help.’ It was all pretty familiar. He was a bit more exposed than Kon had been when they were teenagers, but times had shifted and he was from the "notoriously horny lantern corps," so really he looked a little nunnish. But like. In a wildly gay way.  He stretched a little before closing the gap and landing. “Hey, sorry I’m a little late, I had to deal with this...thing. Uh, anyway, good to meet you two, Red Robin’s told me...not a lot about you, actually. I feel like this is a trend.”

Bart nodded. “You’re fine, we know Tim’s name, you don’t have to remind us about that codename.”

Slobo snorted. “Ain’t that a burger joint?”

“Not in this timeline, lucky for him.”

The Sapphire frowned. “Oh. Um. But how did you know that I knew his name--”

“Conrad.” 

Conrad, the suddenly very awkward Star Sapphire, cleared his throat. “Oh, wow, okay so I didn’t know they were telling people my business--”

Slobo rubbed his eyelids. “I’m Slobo, this is Burt.”

“Bart.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

Conrad nodded. “Well, yeah I know that--”

“Then why wouldn’t you expect us to know your name?!” Bart hissed.

“Well cause I’m like...just a guy. I barely have a file in the batcomputer. Well. I mean I guess it’s actually likely that most of my file is out of my clearance because they’re paranoid and insane, but also I guess I did--nevermind. It’s fine. You seem like good guys, veterans and all that.”

Slobo chuckled. “Man, they’re already calling you old?”

Bart rolled his eyes. “Can we just move on before Slobo turns into the biggest, grossest spatter of bird poop of all time?”

Conrad winced. “Okay, right, yeah. Sooo...ring says you’re a Czarnian? That’s rare. What’s broken?”

“Everythin.’” Slobo deadpanned. 

Conrad nodded. “Yeeeeah that’s what it looks like at first glance. I’m just going to take a little scan--oh I see, you’re basically melting. That’s not ideal.”

Bart tapped his foot. “Well? Can you fix it?”

Conrad looked back-and-forth between them before biting his lip. “Ehh...not with the present resources.”

“W-what? I thought your entire bit was that you can use love to heal anything?” 

“Hey! I-I have other bits!”

“They’re not as good as curing cancer.”

Conrad pouted. “Look, yes, I can heal anything if I meet the requirements. But there are requirements. The more complex, delicate, or just generally impossible the repair, the more intense the love connection has to be to pull it off. A pair of parents who desperately want their kid to survive is enough for something like cancer. But see, your entire genetic structure is just...losing stability. There’s a lot of little changes to make, and your biology is actually super complicated. Not Martian bad, but up there. What I’m saying is that you need someone who loves you more than Bart in order to stabilize you, and undo the damage you’ve already suffered.”

Slobo snorted. “Yeah well, that’s a low bar, and even then it’s gonna be hard to clear, probably.”

Bart crossed his arms. “‘Low bar?’ Are you kidding me?”

“S’not like we were close or nothin’--”

“I just ran through time to pull you out of Gay Baby Jail, does that not suggest to you that I care?”

Slobo rubbed his arm. “I’m not actually upset that we weren’t friends or nothin’, so you don’t gotta--”

Conrad groaned. “Okay, not my circus, not my monkeys, let me just nudge this a bit: Slobo, Bart cares enough for me to replace most of your organs, I dunno what your whole...dynamic was, and I’m not digging around to look, but you’re both decently fond of each other, okay? I just need someone that keeps a piece of you in their heart. Doesn’t gotta be romantic, but it’s gotta be genuine and enduring. Unconditional helps.”

Slobo groaned. “...Whatever, we got the same problem still, don’t have nobody like that.”

Bart shook his head and rubbed his eyelids. “Grife. Starboy--”

“Heh, Superboy calls me that--”

“Yeah, they’re all like that--can’t you like...I dunno, do a love thing?”

Conrad squinted at him. “...Oh, I get it now. I owe my boyfriend an apology. Yes I can do a ‘love thing,’ I can do many ‘love things,’ but you’ll have to specify--”

“Find an enduring love!” Bart was getting a little cranky. 

[fipindustries]

AIs dont understand the real world

a lot has been said over the fact that LLMs dont actually understand the real world, just the statistical relationship between empty tokens, empty words. i say "empty" because in the AI's mind those words dont actually connect to a real world understanding of what the words represent. the AI may understand that the collection of letters "D-O-G" may have some statistical connection to "T-A-I-L" and "F-U-R" and "P-O-O-D-L-E" but it doesnt actually know anything about what an actual Dog is or what is a Tail or actual Fur or real life Poodles.

and yet it seems to be capable of holding remarcably coherent conversations. it seems more and more, with each new model that comes out, to become better at answering questions, at reasoning, at creating original writing. if it doesnt truly understand the world it sure seems to get better at acting like it does with nothing but just a statistical understanding of how words are related to each other.

i guess the question ultimatly is "if you understand well enough the relationship between raw symbols could you have an understanding of the underlying relatonships between the things these symbols represent?"

now, let me take a small tangent towards human understanding. specifically towards what philosophy has to say about it.

one of the classic problems philosophers deal with is, how do we know the world is real. how do we know we can trust our senses, how do we know the truth? many argue that we cant. that we dont really percieve the true world out there beyond ourselves. all we can percieve is what our senses are telling us about the world.

lets think of sight.

if you think about it, we dont really "see" objects, right? we just see the light that bounces off those objects. and even then we dont really "see" the photons that collide with our eye, we see the images that our brain generates in our mind, presumably because the corresponding photons collided with our eye. but colorblind people and people who experience visual hallucinations have shown that what we see doesnt have to always correspond with actual phisical phenomena occuring in the real world.

we dont see the real world, we see referents to it. and from the relationships between these referents we start to infer the properties of the actual world out there. are the lights that hit our eye similar to the words that the LLM is trained on? only a referent whose understanding allows it to function in the real world, even if it cant actually "percieve" the "real" world.

but, one might say, we dont just have sight. we have other senses, we have smell and touch and taste and audition. all of these things allow us to form a much richer and multidimensional understanding of the world, even if by virtue of being human senses they have all the problems that sight has of being one step removed from the real world. so to this i will say that multimodal AIs also exist. AIs that can connect audio and visuals and words together and form relationships between all of this disparate data.

so then, can it be said that they understand the world? and if not yet, is that a cathegorical difference or merely a difference of degree. that is to say, not that they cathegorically cant understand the world but simply that they understand it less well than humans do.

[caramelmochacrow]

okayyyyy d4dj pride hcs for pride month let's goooooooo!!!!! (gonna be going by unit order lol)

hapiara:

honestly been getting into rin.rei and muni.maho more often so my poly hc of them is sort of going away, but I still love them poly <3 (I just dont draw them together as much but i still love them)

maho my she/they lesbian... everyone are lesbians as well but yeaaa !! <3

peaky:

kyoko's bi (w a preference for women) yibbpppeeeee!! shinobu's a transgirl to me <333 but wears pretty masc clothes, bc, she wants to be kyoko's handsome girlfriend.!!(idk if I'm making sense lol) sometimes I like enjoy t4t kyoshino,but I think w how much I love it, might as well become a proper headcanon for me.

yuka is a lesbian. esora's a lesbian too. Yuka also possibly a futch yeah. maybe a biiiit more masc tho. esora's fem yea

photon:

saki and ibuki are aro and ace respectively. ibuki might be leaning on aroace tho. saki mayyybe demisexual? not sure, but I'm very sure she's aro. OH SAKI ALSO USES SPACE-THEMED NEOPRONOUNS!!

noa's just sapphic, she loves anything fem. maybe t4t w towa bc.... wahghghghghghghg (towa's just a lesbian)

m4:

bi4bi4bi4bi m4 (that's a lot of 4s lol) ummmmmmm yayyyyy

rondo:

honestly fuck it: aoi genderfluid. she/they/he. yeah. he/they nagisa, yeah. hiiro and tsubaki are trans too, yeah, rondo is full of trans people. aoi just says she's queer to make explaining everything easier. nagisa still refers to himself as a lesbian bc that's the label he's most comfortable with. hiiro is pan and tsubaki's just queer. yay. (I don't rlly know what label to give her so she's going unlabeled or queer for now. yay)

ri4:

haruna the biggest lesbian ever. Miyu's probably just gonna say sapphic or queer (not too sure, but she knows she loves haruna yayyyyy) kurumi and miiko....... they're queer platonic and don't rlly care abt love??? like, they're just. meh. I wouldn't say they're ace/aro tho.

unichord:

sapphic hayakoko yayayayayayyayayay michiru.... ally!!! (JOKE! she's probs questioning) lumina feels..... hmmm. not sure but yeah :thumbs-up:

abyssmare:

this is a slight fuck u to assholes on d4twt so weronika is bi. soap is demiromantic asexual. neo........ not sure. lol. Elsie is a lesbian but she doesn't want to believe it

CoA:

at this point they're too busy w work and music to give a shit abt gender and sexuality but if u asked mana might just say pan, airi never thought abt it but when she hears hapiara or the others explain stuff she's like "OOOOHHHH MAYBE I FIT ONE OF THOSE.. huh" toka just shrugs and asks where's my water before saying ten minutes later "oh I might be a lesbian. idk." and shano is just gonna say she's busy and not giving an answer. (she's always kinda knew she was queer in some way but never thought abt it bc of schedule)

LMO:

YEAH YOU THOUGHT I WOULDNT INCLUDE THEM?? THEYRE MY TOKEN OLD MEN YAOI !!!!

ryujin is a gay man. he knows this bc of the amount of sapphics that enter his cafe. haruki would probs go "yeah maybe" and dennojo and sho will just glare at you and go "no." but you know they're liars bc when he sat next to their wives in the middle of the night, with their heads in their hands, they're nothing more than their husbands and when they thinks abt each other all of those years ago, they're standing face to face with "I told you so"-- AHEM. yeah. sho's a homophobic homosexual tho, dennojo supports his trans granddaughter and he/they grandson/grandchild. yeah.

bonus: (my inuyose sibling ocs and maika)

hifuno is a demiromantic asexual and yanoshiro is a she/they queer. yay. yaro doesn't know if she's interested in women or men bc she was so focused on her education she didn't explore that. lol.

maika is questioning if she likes girls and cis!! (but I will say I was tempted to make her trans...... but WAHH I feel too self-indulgent w that) shinobu was her gay awakening. i'll talk abt maika lore another day anyway that's it

[irisgoesgardening]

Zexal Month, Day 21 + 22: Originality + Powers

@zexalmonth Magical Numbers Hunters AU!! In which Photon Transformation becomes the key to hunting numbers. I have been releasing snippets of the story throughout my art blog. You can find them here: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6

The story is as follows:

BACKSTORY: Thousands of years ago, the gods battled to determine if chaos or order would prevail. The legendary warrior Astral sacrificed his memories to seal away the god of chaos, Don Thousand. However, Astral World would not be victorious for long. Astral's memories were scattered across the human plane in the form of Number cards, meant to be the gods' blessings upon mankind. With the last of his powers, Don Thousand cursed the Numbers to possess its wielders and manifest their deepest desires. In turn, Eliphas vowed that if there ever was to be a being who could collect all of the Numbers without sullying their soul, they would be able to obtain a wish from the gods and determine the battle between chaos and order, once and for all. Of course the task is impossible. Numbers are too powerful. Those who have tried throughout history were condemned to madness and destruction upon trying to wield the power of the gods.

Until two scientists are determined to end the war, once and for all.

Mitsuko Tenjo and Dr. Faker attempt to build Numbers immunity in humans. Along the way, Mitsuko gives birth to Kaito.

Then, they have a breakthrough—the Numbers are linked to other dimensions.

Thus, Byron enters. He has been researching dimensions and how certain humans have higher "spiritual drift" values than others. Humans with high drift aptitudes are able to wield Numbers for longer than the average human due to their close connection with the home of the gods (the other dimensions). Unfortunately, once Don Thousand's curse sets in, they become an extremely dangerous individual. The three work together for a few years. Due to the stress of the work, Mitsuko finds that she can no longer have children. She falls into despair, deciding to collect all the Numbers to have another child. With all of the progress they have made, Mitsuko decides to set out and become the first Hunter—Hunter Starlight. One day on a hunt, she and Faker encounter the Barians. They offer to grant her wish as long as her future child will fight on behalf of Barian World to destroy Astral World. They accept. Eventually, Haruto arrives, but at that point, Mitsuko's body has deteriorated from collecting Numbers. She dies, leaving Dr. Faker heartbroken. Although she didn't succumb to Don Thousand's curse, her body slowly withered away.

This was the cost of using the power of the gods. Haruto is born weak. Dr. Faker seeks out the Barians to break the contract. They laugh in his face and say after he collects all the Numbers, they'll heal Haruto. For now, if he doesn't want Haruto to end up like his mother, he'll need to find a few replacements. They hint that the most powerful Hunters are born from despair. Kaito is the perfect candidate. Before he begins his experiments on his son, Dr. Faker must be sure though. He turns his eye on Byron and Kazuma Tsukumo's sons. Yuma Tsukumo is randomly picked to see if an average citizen of Heartland could become a Hunter. Cue episode 55's flashback. This time, Faker sacrifices Byron and Kazuma for his experiment but also to buy more time for Haruto. "Take two innocent souls as a token of my goodwill" kinda messed up shit. In turn, the Barians give Haruto powers to destroy Astral World but still refuse to break his contract. Faker proceeds to isolate Christopher and further plunge him into despair. When he is at the end of his rope, Dr. Faker asks if he wishes to become a Hunter. Hunter V is soon born. He is instructed to train Kaito to become a Hunter as well. Faker continues to keep a close eye on Yuma and Kamishiro Rio and Ryoga—twins with abnormally high spiritual drift values. TO BE A HUNTER: Hunters are legends in Heartland City. Their identities are kept secret, but they are hailed as heroes to mankind. To become a Hunter, there are five key determinants: 1. Despair Values (Or, D-levels) 2. Physical Strength 3. Mental Fortitude 4. Spiritual Drift (Or, the individual's ability to communicate with the Numbers/drift between dimensions) 5. Numbers Affinity (Their compatibility with their Number) Episode summary in the reblog!!

[mothheart]

rules: shuffle your ‘on repeat’ playlist and post the first 10 songs, then tag 10 friends.

tagged by @confirmedcannibal yay

tags:

@c0d33 @innocencelives @mxscarlettrae @bluepriestess UMM my memory is bad and i can't think of 10 people but if even if i didn't tag you feel free to do this and say i tagged you!!

[snugglyporos]

// So I think Marvels is perfectly indicative of two things: one, that Marvel has quickly found itself running out of main characters that people care about, and two, it's about five years late to making content which is transparently meant to be marketed through gifs.

Like, I as a comic knower know these characters. But I can't imagine your average viewer does? Because to know them you'd have to watch the shows and piece together things from at least three not to mention a bunch of other movies? Like, Captain Marvel is all over the place in terms of power levels, Photon exists in this universe because magic wall at the end of Wandavision, and Ms. Marvel is, well...

I mean, Marvel as a company doesn't care about her expect to use her as a token diversity character, which sucks because she's interesting and has a ton of potential. But there's a reason she's gone from Inhuman to Mutant and from super teams to possible future president and who knows what else, because her only constant in Marvel's eyes is 'is muslim representation' in the same way that the the only constant for Black Panther twenty years ago was 'is african representation.'

And that sucks, but you can't fix a thing without acknowledging that the company pushing it blatantly thinks you're an easily satisfied mark for empty platitudes.

Oh right, Marvels.

So Marvel 100% has no chance of keeping this universe going without a reboot. You have lost basically every A-lister, and no offense to the cast of Marvels but we're dipping into C-listers here, which means only nerds know who they are.

Also, this is clearly meant to be shared in gif format. An entire planet of singing and dancing? Clearly meant to be bollywood esque? It's like the executives discovered tumblr a year ago.

I should point out none of this is the fault of any of the actresses. They're doing their best. But the writing is, quite frankly, soulless. It's hollow. It's worse than if an AI wrote it, at least that might try to emulate emotion. This doesn't even do that. It feels like it's pandering in the worst sense, that it can serve you anything and you'll be happy.

It's not even bad it's just... okay. If it was bad you could have a thing to say about it. But it's not bad, it's average. It's like nutrient paste in movie form; it's tofu, in the sense that its flavor is whatever flavor you as a person bring to it.

Meaning if you are attached to these themes, gags, and moments, you'll probably love it. And if you don't, you won't. But that's not because of it, it's because of you.

It just doesn't have any ambition or desire or spirit or passion in it, no matter how much the actresses try to give it some.

[schnabel53]

JJ2 update + event dialogue

The new update changed some things that I think were interesting, like the bot brain fights you in, changing from red to green. Just a couple of observations, plus event stuff, some of the conversations are unfinished because I only screenshoted what I thought was interesting.

Brains’s bot

The machine brains fights Barry at the end of Legitimate Research changed color, along with the legitimate logo being added. It was originally red, a better contrast to brains hair. But I think the color change happened because Red Photon’s final fight is also a red bot. Just to differentiate the boss fights.

The sticker album still has the red version, interestingly enough.

Big Stomper background

Before this update, the background for Stomper would be wherever you were before getting the vehicle token. Just the base background for whatever level you were in. This was the only vehicle without a distinct background, the Galaxy Ship had a space background, the Gravity Suit had a vapor wave background and Wild Wild Rex had a desert. After the update, the background is a trash yard outside of Legitimate Research.

I don’t know why, this really hit me how different this is to what we’ve seen of LR so far. It’s so gray and foggy in the background, looks like they’re burning coal and releasing the fumes. It just looks so sad to me, Barry crashing through their walls everyday hasn’t stopped the progress and destruction of LR. I’m thinking too far into this, but still just shocked me went I saw it the first time

Sometimes Rory will appear on one of the trash piles, just hanging out.

Sometimes SAM will appear behind the trash piles, broken and thrown away. I know every time Barry uses it, it eventually breaks, but this is telling us he’s not coming back this time.

Event Dialogue

This is the second piece of dialogue, the first being Craig telling Barry he’s gonna tell him some JJ facts and Barry asking if it’s to him or the player. These screenshots are missing Barry’s response to Craig, but it was similar to Betty’s.

There is a response from Robo-Barry that he wasn’t listening because he was on power saving mode.

I think this is all the dialogue for this. Also in the main game, the crying brains sprite is never used. I’d love if there was an event where we went to Betty’s universe, seems like it would be fun.

Craig says you can play JJ with one finger. Barry responds we’ve all done the tutorial, Craig.

Barry being Barry, what else do I have to say.

This is interesting because there is no Robo-Betty, unless she hasn’t been made yet or the talking toaster is Robo-Betty. If the former is true, this means their universes have more variation then just gender-bent characters.

I ran out of room for photos :( I’ll put the transcripts for the rest (these two dialogues are my favorites too!):

(This is the only one I can fit, transcript below, I am missing one piece of dialogue I can’t remember that comes before this one, but it’s part of a jingle.)

*Tailor: We’re still working on that jingle…*

*Tailor: Mention code BARRY for a 25% discount!*

*Tailor: Otto’s Tailors! - expert in sleeve reattachment for thirty five years!*

I think this is interesting, because this means that Otto has been Barry’s tailor since he was a kid. Or there’s a weird amount of people losing there sleeves, but it’s thirty five is around the estimated age of Barry. Plus the sprite I showed isn’t used when you originally meet him.

*Barry: I had all my inheritance in the gramophone business…*

*Barry: I was gonna be rich…*

*Barry: Then those MP3 players came along and ruined everything!*

*Barry: Thank goodness for floating coins! *

He’s talking to Craig btw. But this is so interesting to me. MP3 players were invented in 1997, and if he is 35 years old, he would have been born in 1988, in 1997 he would be 9. He couldn’t have invented his money at before that time unless he is much older. This would also match up with Otto because it would be when he was a kid when he would start ripping his sleeves. He would have to be born in 1979 to be at least 18 during that year. Another option for this is his father invested the money and the gramophone business that his father was working at/already invested in, took Barry’s inheritance and invested it and told Barry they would be rich. This would make him being around 35 and we know Barry’s father isn’t the best dad.

[borreloadsavagedragon]

for the "send you a character" your beloved onion boy

Onion posting...... my favorite

First impression: Ok so Some Jay lore Deadass I thought I was gonna hate him I was so sure Ryouga was where I was gonna go if I had to pick a favorite and, with a lot of the bits I got before actually watching, Kaito just did not fit the characters I was drawn most towards at the time. I used to stick to more light-hearted, sunshine characters, like token dumbasses with hearts of gold with a few exceptions to which Ryouga was gonna be because I IRL am such an aggressive fan of sharks the animals, plus he was the ~bff~ trope character in my eyes and this was someone who lived breathed and died Takeru Homura and Katsyua Jounouchi And while I love Kaiba and Ryoken, it took some time to find love for them

Impression now: Uh. He's alright. Just ignore my social media, how I took Photon to 2 YCSs despite the very poor matchup conditions(AND WENT 2-2 FOR FOUR ROUNDS WITH IT IN PEAK KASH FORMAT!!! SIMPLY BE BUILT DIFFERENT), and the near 10k and growing character analysis oh and like majority of the fanfiction I've written for the last 1.5 yrs now plus this tweet:

sweats profusely To say he's impacted me quite a bit would be an understatement. Everytime something photon related happens in the tcg, I wake up to 10 different DMs and it's all this twink's fault

Favorite moment: omfg how does one pick a favorite when the character has become your entire life for a minute LOL Uhhhhhhhhh I will say I have the clip of him jumping into the cockpit saved on my phone for chuckles ajgkdlsj I love his duel against Ryouga, it's very showing of his character and his impact, also love how they banter His rematch duel with Yuma at the end of Part 1 is also really good, love to see him encounter his own uncertainty and let himself be inspired by Yuma I love that he stares at the footage of Mizael in the monitors in his lab like a freak after their first duel His duel with Shun in Arc V is always a rewatchable one

Idea for a story: Every story you could imagine!!!!! The one I'm currently most actively working on between upcoming ship week work is a semi-complicated post canon AU that has a past life subplot to it because lord I'm just gonna fill in the wasted potential subplots for Kaito myself at this rate ALLEGEDLY Have an OC I'm working on that ties back to him too, that's also lowkey in that lore also Stay tuned :)

Unpopular opinion: UH, the one I wanna say I'll wait for another ask that's currently in my inbox gjdsal So here is another from the analysis from another take I saw awhile ago:

I also think one of the long forgotten truths of Zexal is Yuma rarely sees anyone as a true villain. There are a few exceptions to this of course, Don Thousand and Mr. Heartland both come to mind, but Yuma manages to find compassion in just about everyone he faces and uses dueling as a way to bridge the gap between him and them, even ones who arguably don’t deserve it like Faker, Tron, and… well, beloved mothman Vector. If Kaito was ever supposed to look like a terrible person when he’s at the height of his crime spree, we would have seen that from Yuma’s perspective. Instead we see Yuma's fear, his intrigue, and ultimately, his motivation. Motivation to protect Astral from what’s to come, and then following the conclusion of the Kaito vs Zexal duel, motivation to help Kaito, and finally, the motivation to get to his level. Instead of the same treatment we get for other unforgivable types, we get to see Kaito for what he is beneath the snark, the beatdown strategies, and the unconditional love for his brother: he's lonely, he's incredibly desperate, and he's dangerously selfless for those who are the most important to him, so much so he initially struggled to find his next purpose.

I'm also on record for considering Kaito the strongest of all of the rivals lmao

Favorite relationship: Honestly all of them, family, ships, friends, I love how Kaito is written with others both in the shows(Zexal and Arc V both), the manga, and even Duel Links gives some of his lesser shown rivalries and connections more depth Kaito and Ryouga's rivalry is proooobably my favorite though? Especially including Duel Links moments, they've got so much in common but just will not connect unless it's to show the other up, but you know it's game over when they can find a strong reason to remain on the same page Also the card Photon Emperor exists, which is one, named very suspiciously, two, has a similar cape design to Nasch with the shoulder gems and the cape being attached by those pieces, and 3, very notably resurrects itself when it's sent to GY from hand, deck, or when it's detached as material from an XYZ At the same time, I LOVE Kaito and Mizael's entire story too, both as a rivalry and a relationship, god they're so good and it's truly so hard to put into words how much I love their dynamic, the parallels, how they match each other's crazy, they have my longest ship playlist gjkldadas For Arc V, I'm also a sucker for Kaito and Shun as well as Kaito and Edo Shun went back for him and wasn't going to quit until he convinced him,,, and Edo and Kaito have such strong chemistry for no reason, it's not unwelcome at all-- they just threw men at him for some reason and I'm all for it

Favorite headcanon:

I ALWAYS write him as both touch repulsed and touch starved because he's almost never shown without his jacket during canon except for a handful of flashbacks and exactly that one examination scene, and even in the flashbacks, all you get is his forearms from his one collared shirt

He'd rather die than sacrifice his aesthetic, an icon

[the-game-day]

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[emaward]

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[jcmarchi]

The Sequence Radar #516: NVIDIA’s AI Hardware and Software Synergies are Getting Scary Good

New Post has been published on https://thedigitalinsider.com/the-sequence-radar-516-nvidias-ai-hardware-and-software-synergies-are-getting-scary-good/

The Sequence Radar #516: NVIDIA’s AI Hardware and Software Synergies are Getting Scary Good

The announcements at GTC showcased covered both AI chips and models.

Created Using Midjourney

Next Week in The Sequence:

We do a summary of our series about RAG. The opinion edition discusses whether NVIDIA is the best VC in AI. The engineering installement explores a new AI framework. The research edition explores the amazing Search-R1 model.

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📝 Editorial: NVIDIA’s AI Hardware and Software Synergies are Getting Scary Good

NVIDIA’s GTC never disappoints. This year’s announcements covered everything from powerhouse GPUs to sleek open-source software, forming a two-pronged strategy that’s all about speed, scale, and smarter AI. With hardware like Blackwell Ultra and Rubin, and tools like Llama Nemotron and Dynamo, NVIDIA is rewriting what’s possible for AI development.

Let’s start with the hardware. The Blackwell Ultra AI Factory Platform is NVIDIA’s latest rack-scale beast, packing 72 Blackwell Ultra GPUs and 36 Grace CPUs. It’s 1.5x faster than the previous gen and tailor-made for agentic AI workloads—think AI agents doing real reasoning, not just autocomplete.

Then there’s the long game. Jensen Huang introduced the upcoming Rubin Ultra NVL576 platform, coming in late 2027, which will link up 576 Rubin GPUs using HBM4 memory and the next-gen NVLink interconnect. Before that, in late 2026, we’ll see the Vera Rubin NVL144 platform, with 144 Rubin GPUs and Vera CPUs hitting 3.6 exaflops of FP4 inference—over 3x faster than Blackwell Ultra. NVIDIA’s clearly gearing up for the huge compute demands of next-gen reasoning models like DeepSeek-R1.

On the software side, NVIDIA launched the Llama Nemotron family—open-source reasoning models designed to be way more accurate (20% better) and way faster (5x speed boost) than standard Llama models. Whether you’re building math solvers, code generators, or AI copilots, Nemotron comes in Nano, Super, and Ultra versions to fit different needs. Big names are already onboard. Microsoft’s integrating these models into Azure AI Foundry, and SAP’s adding them to its Joule copilot. These aren’t just nice-to-have tools—they’re key to building a workforce of AI agents that can actually solve problems on their own.

Enter Dynamo, NVIDIA’s new open-source inference framework. It’s all about squeezing maximum performance from your GPUs. With smart scheduling and separate prefill/decode stages, Dynamo helps Blackwell hardware handle up to 30x more requests, all while cutting latency and costs.

This is especially important for today’s large-scale reasoning models, which chew through tons of tokens per query. Dynamo makes sure all that GPU horsepower isn’t going to waste. While Blackwell is today’s star, the Rubin architecture is next in line. Launching late 2026, the Vera Rubin GPU and its 88-core Vera CPU are set to deliver 50 petaflops of inference—2.5x Blackwell’s output. Rubin Ultra scales that to 576 GPUs per rack.

Looking even further ahead, NVIDIA teased the Feynman architecture (arriving in 2028), which will take things up another notch with photonics-enhanced designs. With a new GPU family dropping every two years, NVIDIA’s not just moving fast—it’s setting the pace.

The real story here is synergy. Blackwell and Rubin bring the power. Nemotron and Dynamo help you use it smartly. This combo is exactly what enterprises need as they move toward AI factories—data centers built from the ground up for AI-driven workflows. GTC 2025 wasn’t just a product showcase—it was a blueprint for the next decade of AI. With open models like Nemotron, deployment tools like Dynamo, and next-gen platforms like Rubin and Feynman, NVIDIA’s making it easier than ever to build smart, scalable AI. The future of computing isn’t just fast—it’s intelligent. And NVIDIA’s making sure everyone—from startups to hyperscalers—has the tools to keep up.

🔎 AI Research

Synthetic Data and Differential Privacy

In the paper“Private prediction for large-scale synthetic text generation“ researchers from Google present an approach for generating differentially private synthetic text using large language models via private prediction. Their method achieves the generation of thousands of high-quality synthetic data points, a significant increase compared to previous work in this paradigm, through improvements in privacy analysis, private selection mechanisms, and a novel use of public predictions.

KBLAM

In the paper “KBLAM: KNOWLEDGE BASE AUGMENTED LANGUAGE MODEL” Microsoft Research propose KBLAM, a new method for augmenting large language models with external knowledge from a knowledge base. KBLAM transforms knowledge triples into continuous key-value vector pairs and integrates them into LLMs using a specialized rectangular attention mechanism, differing from RAG by not requiring a separate retrieval module and offering efficient scaling with the knowledge base size.

Search-R1

In the paper “Search-R1: Training LLMs to Reason and Leverage Search Engines with Reinforcement Learning” researchers from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign introduce SEARCH-R1, a novel reinforcement learning framework that enables large language models to interleave self-reasoning with real-time search engine interactions. This framework optimizes LLM rollouts with multi-turn search, utilizing retrieved token masking for stable RL training and a simple outcome-based reward function, demonstrating significant performance improvements on various question-answering datasets.

Cosmos-Reason1

In the paper“Cosmos-Reason1: From Physical Common Sense To Embodied Reasoning” researchers from NVIDIA present Cosmos-Reason1, a family of multimodal large language models specialized in understanding and reasoning about the physical world. The development involved defining ontologies for physical common sense and embodied reasoning, creating corresponding benchmarks, and training models through vision pre-training, supervised fine-tuning, and reinforcement learning to enhance their capabilities in intuitive physics and embodied tasks.

Expert Race

This paper,“Expert Race: A Flexible Routing Strategy for Scaling Diffusion Transformer with Mixture of Experts”, presents additional results on the ImageNet 256×256 dataset by researchers who trained a Mixture of Experts (MoE) model called Expert Race, building upon the DiT architecture. The results show that their MoE model achieves better performance and faster convergence compared to a vanilla DiT model with a similar number of activated parameters, using a larger batch size and a specific training protocol.

RL in Small LLMs

In the paper “Reinforcement Learning for Reasoning in Small LLMs: What Works and What Doesn’t” AI researchers investigate the use of reinforcement learning to improve reasoning in a small (1.5 billion parameter) language model under strict computational constraints. By adapting the GRPO algorithm and using a curated mathematical reasoning dataset, they demonstrated significant reasoning gains on benchmarks with minimal data and cost, highlighting the potential of RL for enhancing small LLMs in resource-limited environments.

📶AI Eval of the Weeek

(Courtesy of LayerLens )

Mistral Small 3.1 came out this week with some impressive results. The model seems very strong in programming benchmarks like Human Eval.

Mistral Small 3.1 also outperforms similar size models like Gemma 3.

🤖 AI Tech Releases

Claude Search

Anthropic added search capabilities to Claude.

Mistral Small 3.1

Mistral launched Small 3.1, a multimodal small model with impressive performance.

Model Optimization

Pruna AI open sourced its famout AI optimization framework.

📡AI Radar

NVIDIA acquired synthetic data platform Gretel AI.

Perplexity is raising a new round at $18 billion valuation.

SoftBank announced the acquisition of semiconductor platform Ampere Computing.

Data analytic company Dataminr raised $85 million in new funding.

AI security platform Orion Security emerged from stealth mode with $6 million in funding.

Roblox launched Roblox Cube, a new gen AI system for 3D and 4D assets.

Halliday blockchain-agentic platform raised $20 million in new funding.

ClearGrid raised $10 million to automated debt collection with AI.

Tera AI raised $7.8 million for its robotics navigation platform.

AI presentation platform Present raised $20 million in new funding.

[gamedev01]

Top 10 Tips for Successful Ludo Game Development

Ludo, a classic board game loved by people worldwide, has transitioned beautifully into the digital space. The online version of Ludo has captivated millions of players, making it a lucrative niche for game developers. However, creating a successful Ludo game development involves more than just replicating the traditional gameplay. It requires a mix of technical expertise, user-focused design, and strategic planning.

In this blog, we’ll share 10 essential tips to help you develop a Ludo game that stands out in the competitive gaming market.

1. Understand the Game Dynamics

Ludo is a strategy-based game with simple rules. To create an engaging digital version, ensure you understand its core mechanics:

Movement based on dice rolls.

Progression from start to home.

Rules for capturing opponent tokens.

Deep knowledge of these elements will help you design a balanced and enjoyable game.

2. Choose the Right Technology Stack

Selecting the right technology stack is crucial for ensuring smooth performance. Common tools and frameworks for Ludo game development include:

Game Engines: Unity, Unreal Engine.

Programming Languages: C#, JavaScript.

Databases: Firebase, MySQL for real-time player data.

Networking: Photon or Node.js for multiplayer functionalities.

The stack should align with your platform (Android, iOS, or Web) and scalability requirements.

3. Prioritize User Experience (UX)

A clean, intuitive interface can make or break your Ludo game. Focus on:

Simple Navigation: Ensure players can easily start a game, invite friends, or join public matches.

Aesthetic Design: Use vibrant colors and graphics reminiscent of traditional Ludo boards.

Tutorials: Include easy-to-follow guides for first-time users.

4. Incorporate Multiplayer Functionality

One of the primary reasons for Ludo’s popularity is its social aspect. To recreate this digitally:

Implement real-time multiplayer features.

Offer modes for online play, local multiplayer, and playing against AI.

Enable cross-platform compatibility for a broader audience.

5. Ensure Fair Dice Rolls

Players often suspect digital dice rolls to be rigged. Use algorithms to guarantee fairness:

Random Number Generators (RNG): Ensure dice outcomes are truly random.

Display probabilities to build trust among players.

Transparency in dice rolls can enhance user trust and retention.

6. Add Engaging Features

While staying true to the core gameplay, adding innovative features can make your Ludo game unique:

Custom Boards: Allow users to select themes or design their own boards.

Power-Ups: Introduce power-ups for strategic advantages.

Tournaments: Organize online tournaments with rewards.

7. Focus on Smooth Connectivity

Multiplayer games depend on reliable networking. To prevent frustration caused by lags:

Use dedicated servers for real-time gameplay.

Optimize bandwidth usage for low latency.

Include reconnection features to handle accidental disconnects.

8. Implement Reward Systems

Reward systems can significantly boost user engagement. Consider including:

Daily rewards for logging in.

Leaderboards and achievements to motivate competition.

In-game currency for unlocking skins or features.

9. Ensure Cross-Platform Compatibility

To maximize your audience, make your Ludo game accessible across devices:

Use frameworks like Unity or Flutter to create cross-platform games.

Optimize your game for different screen sizes and resolutions.

Cross-platform availability can increase downloads and user retention.

10. Test, Test, and Test Again

Extensive testing is vital to ensure a seamless experience:

Conduct beta testing to gather feedback from real users.

Test for bugs, crashes, and performance issues across devices.

Regularly update the game based on user feedback.

Final Thoughts

Developing a successful Ludo game requires balancing traditional gameplay with modern features and technical excellence. By focusing on user experience, incorporating multiplayer functionality, and ensuring fair play, you can create a game that resonates with players worldwide.

With these top 10 tips, you’re now equipped to embark on your Ludo game development journey. Whether you're an indie developer or part of a larger team, these strategies will help you create a game that stands out and delights players.

[aiagent]

How to Choose the Right Technology Stack for Ludo Game Development

Ludo, a classic board game that has entertained players for generations, has seen a resurgence in the digital age. The rise of online multiplayer gaming platforms has made Ludo a popular choice for both casual and competitive gamers. If you're planning to develop a Ludo game, selecting the right technology stack is crucial to ensuring the game runs smoothly, provides an enjoyable user experience, and scales effectively.

In this blog, we'll explore how to choose the right technology stack for Ludo game development. We'll break down the components you'll need to consider, including game engines, back-end frameworks, front-end technologies, and databases. By the end, you'll have a clear roadmap to help you make the best decisions for your game development project.

1. Understanding the Core Requirements of a Ludo Game

Before diving into technology options, it’s important to understand the essential features and functionality required for a Ludo game:

Multiplayer functionality: Ludo is traditionally a game played with 2 to 4 players. Therefore, the game must support real-time multiplayer functionality, either locally or over the internet.

Turn-based gameplay: Players take turns rolling dice and moving their tokens accordingly. This requires effective state management and seamless transitions between turns.

Game logic and rules: The game has a set of fixed rules, such as safe zones, home paths, and how players interact with each other. The backend logic needs to enforce these rules.

UI/UX design: Ludo needs a simple but engaging interface with a board, dice, tokens, and player status indicators.

Scalability: The game should be capable of supporting hundreds or thousands of concurrent players without performance degradation.

Cross-platform support: Ideally, your game should be available on multiple platforms, such as web, mobile (iOS/Android), and desktop.

2. Choosing the Right Game Engine

A game engine is the foundation of any game, and for Ludo, it will handle the game’s graphics, animations, and basic game logic. There are several game engines to choose from, each with its own strengths and trade-offs. Here are some popular choices:

Unity

Unity is one of the most popular game engines used for both 2D and 3D games. It is known for its ease of use, large community, and support for multiple platforms, including Android, iOS, Windows, and WebGL. Some reasons to consider Unity for Ludo game development include:

Cross-platform support: Unity makes it easy to deploy your game across multiple platforms with minimal changes to the codebase.

Strong multiplayer support: With Unity’s built-in networking features or third-party solutions like Photon, you can quickly implement multiplayer functionality.

Asset store: Unity has a vast asset store, where you can find pre-made assets, including Ludo game boards, dice, and tokens, which can speed up development.

Godot

Godot is an open-source game engine that is gaining popularity for 2D game development. It is lightweight, easy to use, and highly customizable. If you are looking for a free, open-source solution, Godot is an excellent choice. It supports both 2D and 3D games and has an intuitive drag-and-drop interface for creating game scenes. For Ludo, Godot can handle:

2D game development: Since Ludo is primarily a 2D game, Godot is well-suited for creating the board, tokens, and dice.

Multiplayer options: Godot supports multiplayer via custom scripts and WebSockets, which can be leveraged to implement the turn-based multiplayer system in Ludo.

Cocos2d-x

Cocos2d-x is an open-source game development framework particularly suited for 2D games. It is highly performant and supports multiple platforms, including Android, iOS, and Web. If your focus is on optimizing performance, Cocos2d-x might be a good option:

Cross-platform: Cocos2d-x supports cross-platform game deployment, making it easy to create versions for web and mobile.

Customizable game logic: With Cocos2d-x, you can customize every aspect of the game mechanics, from turn management to animations.

3. Selecting Back-End Technology for Multiplayer Functionality

A robust back-end is crucial for handling the multiplayer features of your Ludo game. The back-end is responsible for user authentication, game state management, matchmaking, and real-time updates. Here are some popular back-end technologies to consider:

Node.js with Socket.IO

Node.js is an excellent choice for building fast, real-time multiplayer games. With its non-blocking, event-driven architecture, Node.js is ideal for handling multiple concurrent connections. Socket.IO, a library built on top of Node.js, facilitates real-time bi-directional communication between the server and the client, which is essential for turn-based games like Ludo. Here’s why you might choose Node.js and Socket.IO:

Real-time communication: Socket.IO enables instant updates between players, such as when it's their turn or when a token moves.

Scalable architecture: Node.js is highly scalable, making it suitable for large-scale multiplayer games.

Firebase

Firebase, by Google, is a cloud-based back-end platform that offers several features for game developers, including real-time databases, authentication, and hosting. Firebase can handle:

Real-time updates: Firebase’s Firestore and Firebase Realtime Database enable you to sync game states across multiple devices in real-time, making it ideal for a turn-based game like Ludo.

Multiplayer management: Firebase Authentication can simplify user login, while Firebase Cloud Functions can handle game logic and matchmaking.

Cross-platform support: Firebase seamlessly integrates with Unity, making it easy to implement multiplayer features for both mobile and web platforms.

4. Choosing Front-End Technologies for UI/UX

The front-end is where the player interacts with the game. It includes the graphical user interface (GUI) that displays the board, dice, tokens, and other game elements. Depending on the platform, the technologies for the front-end will differ:

Web (HTML5, CSS3, JavaScript)

For a web-based Ludo game, HTML5, CSS3, and JavaScript are the primary technologies. HTML5 allows you to create interactive, multimedia-rich applications, while CSS3 enables you to style the board, tokens, and other UI elements. JavaScript (with libraries like Phaser.js) can be used to manage game logic, animations, and interactions.

Responsive design: You can create a responsive design that works across different screen sizes, from desktops to mobile browsers.

Canvas and WebGL: For rendering the game board and animations, you can use HTML5 Canvas or WebGL for better performance.

Mobile (React Native or Flutter)

For mobile game development, you can use frameworks like React Native or Flutter to build cross-platform apps for iOS and Android. Both frameworks allow you to write the game logic once and deploy it on both platforms.

React Native: If you're already familiar with JavaScript, React Native allows you to use your existing skills to create native mobile apps with performance close to that of fully native applications.

Flutter: Flutter is gaining popularity for building high-performance mobile apps. With its expressive UI, it’s perfect for creating the polished, smooth animations Ludo requires.

5. Choosing the Right Database

For storing user data, game progress, and matchmaking information, you need a reliable database. The two most commonly used databases for game development are:

MongoDB

MongoDB is a NoSQL database that is highly scalable and flexible, making it suitable for storing dynamic data such as user profiles, game states, and leaderboards. It integrates well with Node.js and Firebase, making it ideal for real-time multiplayer games.

MySQL or PostgreSQL

If you prefer using a relational database, MySQL or PostgreSQL are solid choices. They provide robust support for structured data, such as player statistics, game history, and match logs.

6. Final Considerations: Testing and Deployment

Testing: Ensure that your game runs smoothly on all targeted platforms and performs well under heavy load. Automated tests and manual playtesting are essential for identifying bugs and balancing the game.

Deployment: Use cloud services like AWS, Google Cloud, or Microsoft Azure for hosting your back-end and databases. These services provide scalability, security, and ease of deployment.

Conclusion

Choosing the right technology stack for your Ludo game development project requires a careful balance of game engine, back-end technologies, front-end frameworks, and databases. By considering the core requirements of your game, such as multiplayer support, cross-platform compatibility, and scalability, you can make an informed decision.

Whether you decide to go with Unity, Godot, or Cocos2d-x, paired with Node.js, Firebase, or MongoDB, the right technology stack will help you build a smooth, engaging, and scalable Ludo game that players will love.

[nexusnoah-cc]

The Innovative Technology Behind Kaspa's Success.

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