#there are multiple instances in particular that i wanted to get more context of

[scarletiswailing347]

just finished reading delilah's statement, there was a lot of things in it that was either only tangentially related to the allegations or straight up unnecessary to put (in particular: putting in media references and cc metrics several times as flavor text, detailing the don turnt situation with no claims of whether or not permission was granted by the affected party, namedropping certain ccs who had nothing to do with the allegations, and putting the tweet and yearbook photo of one of the ppl who put forward that zam was a bully with no claims of whether or not permission was granted) which contributed a lot to the 47-page length

honestly so far what im getting is that there was a Lot of toxicity on multiple sides like not even just between zam and delilah

[howiscallmewhateveridctaken]

Lmfaooo what a week 😅

So a lot of people are, understandably, leaving the fandom. Drama like this always tends to put people off and unfortunately that affects the media they’ve come to love. I’m not going to be one of those people bc honestly, I don’t even know if I was ever that “in” the fandom in the first place to even leave it. My account isn’t and never was a nevermore account, yes I’ve made a few nevermore post but those were infrequent and amongst posts and reblogs of multiple other fandoms. I’m also in the discord server but I’ve only ever been a lurker, and usually only ever go in it when I want more context to something I’ve seen on tumblr. With that being said however, I still plan on reading nevermore when (or if) it continues because in THIS particular instance I can easily separate art from the artist and I’ll explain why in a moment.

Like I said I’m not and never have been very active in the fandom. I learned about this drama through a post from an account I follow and went through the server to find more context. I was not present through any of the actual conflicts but I’ve seen the conversations.

So why am I commenting on this?

Well mainly I want to make a point about para social relationships as well as moderation of servers and fandoms as a creator.

I just want to preface this by saying that after reading through all possible context, perspectives, takes and evidence I could find or come across, I genuinely don’t think red is necessarily a bad/morally wrong person. I DO however think she is in the wrong in this situation especially due to how she handled everything. As for how a lot of people are reacting to everything, there’s a couple of things I’d like to note:

From what I’ve seen, all of this is just one big thing of “he said/she said” and pointing fingers as well as just picking sides. If your absolutely distraught because red didn’t turn out to be the person you thought they were simply because she said things you didn’t like, I understand the disappointment and frustration but please remember that content creators in general aren’t your friends. You don’t know these people, they just do things you happen to like. Now I’m not saying you SHOULDN’T feel upset about it, it’s ok to and you even should if it’s an issue to you feel strongly about but please keep in mind that this isn’t a “sign of their true colors” or anything because you don’t know what they were actually like to begin with. Ofc I don’t mean that to say “expect the worst from people” but more as a reminder that can hopefully help you to look at the situation more critically and logically before jumping in guns blazing. It’s understandable if it affects you emotionally, you were emotionally invested in their work; but please realize this before you let it get to that point. Now on the other side of the coin, there’s the people who I feel as though will just pick the creators side simply because they’re fanboys and will stand by them no matter what. I’m DEFINITELY NOT saying that’s what everyone who’s on red side is, but naturally there’s bound to be a few that are going to dickride for the sake of dickriding. Regardless, there’s a lack of willingness to listen and understand from both sides (at least from what I’ve noticed) and that’s a problem because when no one wants to listen then what’s supposed to be a community coming together to resolve an issue just turns into a giant flame war. Also this should go without saying, but at least give the mods a chance. They obviously handled the whole situation horrendously but they aren’t going to do their jobs any better when they’ve got people coming at them with pitchforks.

Speaking of the moderators. I genuinely can’t wrap my head around how red and the other mods have managed to fumble this badly…….like it’s almost funny. All said and done they all had ONE very simple job and they blew it. Although I very much disagree with it, I do understand red’s decision to unban crimson. They wanted to give them a second chance, sure whatever. What I DONT GET is why would they not at the very least check to see if anyone else would be comfortable with a decision that would possibly affect them or even impact their safety. At the very least a warning to or a discussion with the victims would have been something. Not only that but even after they unban them, once red saw the NUMEROUS amount of people that were upset about it they, they should have immediately banned them again and then apologize after instead of some rushed explanation. But I get it stress gets the better of you. I understand their desire to keep things as transparent as possible (which i appreciate and I’m sure so do many others) but from that first apology/explanation it felt more like red trying to shake responsibility off themselves and pointing fingers in the guise of being transparent. I did see where red was trying to get at in her first statement, but there was also things that she honestly should have just had the foresight to realize wouldn’t put her in a better light, and this is aside from the victim blaming-esque wording. red basically says that she felt like a group of people (including Laci the one who reported crimson) were just out to get crimson, which is absolutely insane but then again it’s the internet so who knows. However it’s super clear that Laci obviously wasn’t lying bc the things she accused crimson of did in fact happen. So even bringing that up was enough for me to raise my eyebrow at but I digress. Then red practically says it was hard to handle the situation bc the evidence provided was censored, but Laci literally offered to give the uncensored versions so that was completely disingenuous on red’s part at best. To me it just seemed like the mods were looking for excuses for what could be there own laziness at best and negligence at worst. Their biggest fault so far is not being very good at actually listening to their audience and taking them into consideration. She also brought up that fact that Laci was apparently the only person to report crimson which I did not like to say the least. One of the victims confided in Laci and Laci brought it forward. I understand reds suspicions about Laci not being in the actual server where it happened but how are you going to immediately jump to “well why did no one else bring it up�� instead of stopping for a sec and thinking “ hm clearly these victims feel uncomfortable stepping forward”. Which they had to do now anyway because of how bad the issue became. They should not have had to do that. Better it be just one person reporting, even if it’s someone you don’t like, than no one reporting and the issue persists under the radar.

And then there’s red’s formal apology…

First off, girl why are you dropping names??? A bunch of who are supposedly minors? Like let’s be so fucking for real right now😭

And then the audacity to be like “please don’t go after or dm these people” like babes if you were genuinely worried about them you wouldn’t have used their names at all. ESPECIALLY when in the end it was completely irrelevant and borderline inappropriate since it really had nothing to do with crimson, their actions or how you handled them. Not to mention the act of calling them “cliques” when literally all they were was side servers. Like if they’re cliques then what does that make red and everyone who’s on her side? It was very clearly just a biased reaction to people saying things she doesn’t like about her, which by all means she has the right to respond to but not in a way that is clearly trying to sway how everyone else sees them. The way red describes everything is as if it’s middle school drama and then proceeds to play directly into it. Don’t get me wrong her apology was fine, when she was ACTUALLY apologizing. Everything else felt like a last ditch effort to drag others under the bus with her. It was lowkey embarrassing to say the least.

Again, it’s important that I make it clear that I don’t believe red is a bad person. I just think she’s an immature person, or at least she is in how she handled everything and continues to handle it bc like I said I don’t know her, and don’t care to frankly. I didn’t start reading nevermore to be buddy buddy with her. Like if we look at the grand scope of things, this is a grown woman beefing with kids. Obviously they aren’t all kids, most of them aren’t I believe but she’s practically stooping down to school yard conflict in how she’s responded so far. Especially at one point in the server when she was being called out and jumped to “yeah I guess I’m the bad guy and totally evil. You all should hate me”. Like actually cut that shit out, what are you doing. I mean honestly.

And my final point because I’ve ranted long enough. I mentioned before that in this instance I am willing to separate the art from the artist, I stand by that because I genuinely do think this is a situation where red could hopefully grow from this and rectify things. The actual unbanning was a stupid and inconsiderate move on her part, but I don’t think she meant any ill-will or had any malicious intent. I disagree with the people calling her a r@pe apologist because that’s honestly just a huge reach. I’ve also seen some accusations of red and/or Flynn being racist, promoting inappropriate art knowing there’s minors around and from what I’ve seen it’s pretty iffy. Regarding the racism, I don’t believe that they are. Their characterizations of the characters regarding their ethnicities IS stereotypical and was obviously just very surface level research into those respective cultures but I chopped that up to ignorance rather than racism. As a woc I was frankly just relived they didn’t make the poc characters centered on some kind of discrimination or tragedy from their era, which yes is something that shouldn’t be ignored but also I don’t know if rednflynn could accurately and more importantly, respectfully portray those types of issues. Nor is it even their place tbh. With that being said however I don’t belong to most of the cultures the characters belong to. To me it never seemed like they were making a caricature out of these cultures, especially since their ethnicities are barely relevant to their stories anyway but I acknowledge that it’s not my place to deem what’s offensive or not.

As for the promoting inappropriate art of the characters and creating some themselves. Yeah they do. I’ve never been shocked about that nor did I think it was something that they are wrong for doing, I mean it’s their own work. Granted I didn’t realize how many minors were in the fandom but that’s literally every fandom, there’s only so much you could do about it. I don’t know if nevermore has a rating but it’s not like it was something ever promoted to be kid friendly, it’s obvious that some scenes are just straight up fan service. While I personally don’t like fan service it never was enough to impact the story so I personally never saw an issue. But point is I don’t think they should have to monitor what is and isn’t appropriate for minors but things get tricky when they have a server where they are clearly aware of minors.

And then there’s other things like people accusing them of promoting SA or some shit like that bc of a lot of stuff involving Montessor which frankly, that’s just a media literacy issue on the readers part. So yeah with that being said I don’t think red is a bad person, although I understand why a lot of people are done with them which is completely fair. I’m pretty much in a grey area about it, who knows if they end up getting in an even bigger scandal, hopefully they come out better from this but only time will tell. The best/smartest thing red has said throughout this entire debacle was that they’re taking a step back from the fandom. I think it’ll be good for everyone, especially them. It seems like it’ll take stress off them anyway. Plus the hole they’ve dug for themselves is already halfway to china by now so there’s that

[arkus-rhapsode]

Gachi-Bachi: A Tale of Two Roads to Success (A Discussion)

Back again with another think piece on this blog. And while the last two came from an inspiration of topics that I had floating around in my head for awhile, this one came about from me scrolling on twitter (I'm not calling it X) recently and noticing the in real time evolution of two of the arguably biggest battle shonen releases of the 2020s. That would be Gachiakuta and Kagurabachi.

However, this isn't gonna be a simple compare and contrast of the series as works of fiction as I personally feel each one has different qualities that really distinguish them from each other in a way that doing a comparison wouldn't be too interesting. Rather what intrigues me is how they are a fascinating study in how series become big so to speak and despite the overlap in fans, there's actually some pretty key differences in their success stories that highlight greater things in the manga industry in particular. So let's ask ourselves: how did we get here, what role has fanbases played in it, what role has their respective magazines played in this, and just how truly successful are these series?

Background and Rise

Now for those who are just not initiated, I'll briefly explain the premise of these two series.

Gachiakuta by Kei Urana is a series set in a dark fantasy world where an orphan named Rudo is banished to the trash filled abyss after being framed for the murder of his adoptive father. In the Abyss Rudo discovers he has the power to use his magic gloves to turn objects into weapons, which he uses as a member of the Cleaners. He fights trash monsters and criminals in a journey to get back home and take revenge on the one who framed him.

Kagurabachi by Takeru Hokazono is an urban fantasy series set in contemporary Japan that deal with Chihiro, the son of a mystical blacksmith who had forged six magic swords. Chihiro's father is killed by a group of magical mobsters and his swords taken from him. Chihiro, armed with a secret seventh magic sword, will cut a blood path through Japan's criminal underbelly and take revenge on those responsible for his father's death.

I know Im grossly summarizing both works because I'm focusing not on the series themselves but rather the things surrounding each of them. So if you wish to know more, please check them out yourselves and see if you enjoy them. And just for transparency's sake, I have made multiple posts on this blog about Gachiakuta so I think its safe to say I enjoy it quite a bit. While my relationship with Kagurabachi is not that intimate as I actually don't read much Weekly Shonen Jump anymore, I did at least read the first volume just so I can say, I totally see why this got a following. Also just for clarity as I know the internet can flatten time in many instances, I want to point out that while I'd call these series contemporary, its worth noting that they're not exactly same time rising stars. Kagurabachi came out this year, in 2024, while Gachiakuta came out in 2022. A whooping two year lead. Hot did Kagurabachi get so hot? How?

Well if you're familiar with Kagurabachi in even a tertiary form you probably remember this meme.

This was a piece of promo art used by Jump along with a brief summary of the series before it was publishized. Now for a little context, at this time, two of Shonen Jump's biggest action staple series, My Hero Academia and Jujutsu Kaisen, were in their twilight stages. And at the time the shonen jump magazine had an interesting assortment of genres probably more than the last two decades. However, while One Piece would still be evergreen and their were action series such as Sakamoto Days and Undead Unluck, there was a hunger for a new battle series. And not just a new battle series, a long term investment battle series.

So when the news came down that WSJ would be releasing a "urban fantasy revenge sword battle series" with an accompanying art that definitely would fit alongside the heroes of the 2000s like Ichigo Kurosaki or Death the Kid, there was a reasonable excitement. Course there was also a bit of an over enthusiasm. Now like I said in my 2000s anime nostalgia post, I don't think this definitively means anything deep that there are just people who got into anime around the 2000s who just enjoy that types of series they were introduced to and were excited for more of that. However, over enthusiasm on the internet, is always prime material for ribbing.

So a lot of people on Ani/manga twitter saw slews of people posting this, and I mean this with no disrespect, kinda bored looking guy drawing his sword and being excited for a series that hadn't come out. This lead to of course memes. Lots of memes.

That this was the best jump manga of all time before a single chapter came out. It even lead to a bunch of people redrawing this promo image several times with different characters each with the same kind of expression. Now of course, this did ignore the fact that there was at least a translated one-shot released by Hokazono that people could at least check out to see if they enjoy his work. As well as the fact this kinda happens everytime there's a new jump rotation. Its just kinda in fan nature to get hyped for something even if all they have is a simple description. But lots of memes tend to flatten out context.

And so it seemed like that was that, the set up for the ultimate punchline. People had some genuine excitement, a bunch of guys on twitter made a mountain of ironic excitement, and now all the series had to come out and not live up to that hype. But then Kagurabachi did come out and the chapter was good. Sure it wasn't change your life spectacular or anything, but for a first chapter of a brand new series, it did exactly what it needed to do: Clearly introduce the stakes of the world, who the main character is, what their motivation is, mixing in some action set pieces, and leaving a little room for intrigue to watch the series grow. It hit the emotional points it wanted and hit the action beats it wanted. The end. That wasn't bad at all. Quite the opposite.

So here we are, left with what was essentially a free marketing campaign for people who probably expected it to get the shonen jump axe like a lot of new action series tended to get and instead they got something pretty okay. If there was ever a group of people vindicated it was those guys excited for Kagurabachi for the start.

Yes I know, meme popularity can be dumb or annoying. And some super fans and hype beasts who want to be there on the ground floor can be kinda cringe, but there is no doubt this was one of the most successful social media campaigns ever for a series that actually was managing to justify it. And for the next few weeks it would keep going and irony was almost completely replaced with sincerity.

The fact this was actually getting Shueisha's social media to acknowledge twitter hashtags and release a promotional trailer for it in English was such a first. Even if you don't like Kagurabachi or are indifferent to it, there is no denying this was unique.

But I've spent all this time reminiscing about Kagurabachi's social media rise. What about Gachiakuta hmm?

Well Gachiakuta was a series made by Kei Urana who had served as an assistant to Atsushi Okubo on the Weekly Shonen Magazine series, Fire Force. Fire Force itself is an odd beast we don't have the time to fully get into, but it was pretty popular for a non jump series and featured Okubo, a creator who has possibly one of the most devout fanbases ever, striking it big with many people's formative anime, Soul Eater. Urana herself was a massive fan of the series and if you've read Gachiakuta you can see the inspiration. However, when it was time for Fire Force to come to a close, WSM had announced that a new series by Okubo's assistant would be starting just before its end. And people were excited right? Well not exactly. Cause you had to be looking in the right places to even notice this announcement.

At the time, WSM series were mostly readable on Azuki. However, there seemed to be a weirdly non commutable relationship with Azuki and WSM's publisher Kodansha. As such it was kinda a gamble if a new WSM series would even show up on Azuki let alone simelpubbed. So it seemed like whatever Gachiakuta was would be Japan exclusive. But as if by miracle, the translation group, Pair of 2+ came in and dropped an English version of the chapter on release. The first chapter of Gachiakuta was pretty strong though mostly for Urana's incredibly striking artstyle. Made even better by the fact that the world of Gachiakuta was a fantasy world. And not fantasy in the way a stereotypical isekai is borrowing from romanticized European fantasy. But rather this sorta grudge world that was capable of having what looked like modern convinces, but there was things like a mysterious trash pit, a bunch of soldiers who dressed in ostentatious uniforms and a ginormous and intimidating trash creature.

I know it might seem kinda like a broken record now, but a big thing in the 2010s era of action manga and anime was a move towards more grounded and contemporary setting with stories. Juxtaposing supernatural or spectacular elements with the modern day Japan structure and order. Plenty of series were popular with this such as My Hero, Jujutsu Kaisen, Chainsaw Man, hell even Demon Slayer does the same though set in a turn of the century version of Japan. These certainly have an appeal and obviously they're not going anywhere, but there was a growing perception that fantasy worlds in manga were kinda fading. We weren't really getting a bunch of One Pieces. Were were getting stuff closer to Bleach. So of course, deny someone something long enough and they become enthusiastic for the tiniest taste of it.

So with all this, how was Gachiakuta's first few weeks. Well outside of some territory nods and the obvious "This manga is trash" jokes. It kinda stayed low key. With people relying on scan groups to handle it, there was really no guarantee of consistent momentum. Sometimes it'd take two weeks to get a chapter out in English while the Spanish versions were available. sometimes another scan group may come in a drop a chapter, making it harder to find the series in one place. However, all of this really did end up benefitting Gachiakuta. Because when you remove convenience you end up creating your strongest soldiers. If you were actively looking for Gachiakuta and not just waiting for an app update, that meant you were committed. And committed people had to use word of mouth to get this out there. If there was a moment of big promotion it would be when AniTuber Gigguk's Trash Taste podcast had well know Vtuber (Full disclaimer I know almost nothing about Vtubers or Hololive. I'm sorry in advance if I'm not going into greater detail on their significance) Mori Calliope discuss the Next Manga award winners and give Gachiakuta a shout out.

So, we had Bachibros and the twitter take over, while we had Gachibros and their slowly growing cult classic. Both methods ended up creating some real die hard fans, but the visibility and promotion of both series is very different. And ties into...

How Each Series Respective Company Has Handled Them

So before I start this section, I know I've made social media a big reference point for the success of these series. I want to make it clear that social media popularity isn't a full story. Something may be popular on twitter or YouTube but not necessarily be successful. I think social media can be a good barometer of the actual interest of a series, but not its end all be all for its results. And I think no series really knew this better than Hunters Guild: Red Hood.

For those unaware, Hunters Guild: Red Hood was a series that released in Weekly Shonen Jump in 2021 and was a big darling with Animanga twitter. Its art style, its premise on western fairytales, going for a more traditional dark fable vibe, and of course attractive characters. It was easily the series a bunch of people were calling the next big thing. And then it flopped. It was regularly last place in the popularity polls and its Japanese volume sales were really unimpressive. So it got axed by Jump.

To say this caused an outrage with people would be an understatement. This caused a trend of people really trying to find "the answer." Try and make this seemingly senseless action make sense. Well tragically if you are a manga industry watcher like me you know that this isn't actually all that unique.

For a lot of non Japanese fans, particularly Americans, we never had the accessibility of the Shonen Jump app or the Manga+ app in the 2000s-2010s. If you wanted manga, you were using MangaStream and MangaPanda which had focused on basically the biggest series in the industry. While countless series that have run in jump and other magazines have just been ended after 20 chapters. But that information wasn't available to us in real time the way it is now.

If you're around my age range and know about the shonen jump ranking system, you were probably introduced to the concept through the series Bakuman, manga about manga that was really the first popularized look at how the sausage was made in the Shuiesha offices. A big thing that was a point of tension was the rankings. If a series fell low consistently in the ranks of readership surveys filled up by the ones who purchased a copy of shonen jump and submitted it, then it would be cancelled by jump. Now its important to remember, Bakuman was a dramatized recreation of how Shueisha operated. Things were exaggerated in the name of making an entertaining and tension filled series. In reality, the ranking system is important, however the editorial department of Jump weights multiple factors when making this judgement: what is in the magazine at the time? Is something ending so we can risk having this run longer? Is there a new batch we want to role out soon so we need to free up space? How are the volume sales doing? And has this carved out a viable niche for itself?

While yes its a good rule of thumb to say something in last place is generally in danger for not maintaining interest to keep it around, its not a simple yes no.

Thanks to Shueisha's Shonen Jump App we now get everything as it comes out. We get the future best and the future failures and there really isn't a way to control it. So to see Red Hood a series with some very vocal fans, it was always at the whims of Japanese customers who seemed neither interested in voting for it over other series in the magazine or purchasing its volumes as they came out. It is a hard pill for people to swallow, to have something that they like, that they want to be invested in and tell its story to be cut short.

But I would say that in this day and age while it is hard to witness this, the benefits of the SJ app are phenomenal. The SJ app is a convent subscription service at a reasonable price that offers the first chapter of a series free as well as the latest three chapters free. So even if you want to not subscribe you can still keep up on an official platform. And Manga+ being similar and not region locked. Thanks to this any new series debuting in Shonen will have the eyes of the world audience on it. When there is a new batch of manga that enter the series, it feels like an event. It really is a high risk high reward situation-you run in WSJ and you have the opportunity for everyone even beyond Japan see your work simultaneously, however you will still have to fight and maintain interest and hype for your series on a weekly basis.

As previously stated, Kagurabachi absolutely benefitted from this. And while yes some it was ironic, the fact that the promise of a new battle series was going to be on everyone's screens and have the biggest reach to find an audience is good. Now of course, we have to remember that WSJ still doesn't let non Japanese voters participate in polls, so while you can find a foreign audience it might not be what gets people excited in Japan (Although there have been instances of foreign fans purchasing Japanese volumes). Well jump may have gone an extra mile with this one. Kagurabachi would actually really early into its run cycle be given a recommendation by Gege Akutani author of Jujutsu Kaisen.

Now for those who actually don't know, in Japan, some manga are printed and packaged with a recommendation band that acts as an extra form of promotion. Siting a famous or well liked author giving a series a recommendation and a little image of the series they worked and sometimes a quote.

Obviously getting an on the cover cosign is a bit more prestigious than say, going to your Barnes and Noble and an employee has written why you may enjoy this series. And not just any mangaka, Kagurabachi was getting props from one the biggest mangaka in the magazine with a pretty ravenous fanbase. But for me a big thing that got my attention that showed how much jump was investing was the previously mention Kagurabachi PV trailer. A simple YouTube animation to get people to check out the work, plenty of series get this. But Kagurabachi's was the first to have it in English. A Japanese company acknowledging the server of the global audience is huge and I'd say this already seemed like it was hyped up enough, but then you have an editor of Jump+ openly acknowledging the "#BachiFlex" in an official statement. There's no doubt there is a fanbase and Jump is absolutely aware of that fact. And of course you can't forget those color pages.

So that's how Kagurabachi was doing, how was Gachiakuta doing? Well first we need to talk about Weekly Shonen Magazine and get something out of the way, they do not have a ranking system like shonen jump. Weekly Shonen Magazine actually seems to operate more along the lines of volume sales. waiting for a manga to hit print and see that actual tangible interest of the people who buy it. Because of this, you can see that WSM has actually a much lower turn over rate than WSJ. And that when there is a new series its usually only one or two at a time in a year. So if the series hinges on sales, it should love having a massive reach?

Well sadly, WSM and Kodansha have been pretty poor when dealing with the global market. I mentioned earlier its relationship with Azuki getting official scans out but there was also the deals it had made with Crunchyroll to have a reader for their work. Both services were not the best received, so wouldn't it be nice if Kodansha had a web service like Jump? A simeulpub on the international market. Well enter K Manga and possibly one of the biggest fumbles ever.

I mentioned before that the SJ app was made with the mind as a subscription service, this was done with awareness of what western audience were willing to financially invest in. Well, Kodansha instead responded with a resigned version of their Magazine Pocket app that included a frankly confusing points and ticket system with just straight up micro-transactions. If you're keyed into the Webtoon scene you probably know this type of weird gamification of a service is done in Asia.

Im sure you've heard the famous quote about how piracy is a service problem and not a pricing problem. People would be perfectly happy to spend money on an official release if the way to access it was ultra convenient. And making Americans learn things like 24 hour tickets, and daily prizes, and just having you pay for each individual chapter. Its just really cumbersome and I'd rather get back to reading scans instead. Also to add some insult to injury it is region locked so even if you wanted to purchase this in countries like Europe, you can't.

I will at least say some positives, I think K manga has a much wider range of series available than the SJ or Manga+ apps. As it takes from Kodansha's many different manga magazines like Weekly Shonen Magazine, Weekly Young Magazine, Monthly Afternoon, Monthly Morning, Bessatsu Shonen Magazine, and Magazine Pocket originals. And Gachiakuta was part of the first few titles at launch and it was some good promotion as later that Fall, Kodansha USA would release the English print copies. But promotion through an app a lot of people weren't really happy with.

Speaking of the print side wasn't doing so hot either. As this may be a surprise to some, WSJ is rare in the fact that it makes manga a real center focus of why you should purchase the magazine, meanwhile many other mags use covergirls.

Look Im not gonna say Shueisha doesn't do this, their Weekly Young Jump covers are really raunchier than this with their cover girls. But yeah not exactly the most bright thing for a series when its being paired against glamor girls and quite literally pushed into a corner.

But it wasn't all bad as Urana would actually end up promoting the series through other means. As mentioned before, a pretty popular Vtuber had already devoted time to promote it of her own free will, Urana herself would even be commissioned to draw cover art for them. Urana would do the same for Jpop band cvlte. We'd even have Kodansha ambassador and professional skateboarder Yuto Horigome have Urana in for a session to talk about art and just recently, British rock band Bring Me The Horizon was promoting the series.

Now its my opinion that no series deserves success or deserves failure. It needs to stand on it own merits and the ones interested will come to it. However, I do find it interesting how Kodansha as a company has chosen to promote their work. Even when its going harder (especially post anime announcement) it feels weirdly word of mouth. Getting all these guys from different subgeneres to talk about it while internationally having such a mixed roll out. But maybe that close inter-personality is what makes the Gachiakuta rise story more unique. Sure it doesn't have the same all eyes on me as Kagurabachi has gotten, but in a way its kinda made this more intimate whether once again cultivating fans who are really really faithful to Gachiakuta's success. This comes to a head in the 101st chapter of Gachiakuta with a color page, Urana thanks her friends in it fitting several graffiti names of people who have supported her and the studio that will be making this a reality.

And hey, while I've definitely been critical of Kodansha, there's no denying that, but hey they agreed to give this series an anime so that must mean its a success. Right?

Success?

So I've been mostly talking about aspects of Gachiakuta and Kagurabachi's more social and industrial significance. How they became popular and how they're been treated by their respective companies. But what about results? Why bore you all with all this hot air when I can just give you cold hard facts? Well by sales-yeah Kagurabachi is a hit. Like there's no other interpretation. It is a hit. It debuted at number 4 on the manga sales chart, by two volume on the market it had hit 100K copies in circulation, and is receiving reprint after reprint.

Also this is a bit tacked on because this happened while I was editing, Kagurabachi just overwhelming won the Next Manga Awards print category. By a huge margin and being the second highest number of votes submitted for a series after Oshi no Ko. Like I don't really have much to say but like... Congrats to Takeru Hokazono. Like there's not denying this is a hit. Like I read the acceptance tweet, he knows. He knows people have been gasing him up as "the next big thing" like. I have nothing else to say this is a success.

The Kagurabachi train is a rolling and knowing how hotly people are anticipating it to fill the shoes of success like MHA or JJK, its showing the results to back up those expectations. In fact, this has actually been one of the few times I've seen a lot of anticipation for a series that doesn't have and anime and that anime is probably off for quite a bit. As of the time I'm writing this Kagurabachi sits at 46 chapters.

As for Gachiakuta this was actually the most surprising for me to actually see the Japanese sales figures.

So for all the anticipation its final result is... okay. Like yeah these sales are fine. There's no way it be in danger of being cancelled and like any business would look at this and say its steady. But that's kinda all it it, steady. I always kinda hate talking about sales that are kinda just doing okay. Cause no one ever wants to be told that its not exceeding expectations, but there's no like rubbernecker cratering that can be entertaining. Its doing just fine. And that's really all there is for a series that's manga only for now.

Obviously the anime is announced. Its coming and it will likely get a boost in audiences interested in it (Know if it doesn't get stuck on like Disney+ or Amazon), but that's kinda why I wanted to get this blog post out before hand. Cause I wanted to compare these series as manga. Now of course you have to remember these sales charts are accounting for Japanese sales on debut. So its likely that there is longer tails than we know of for each series. However, its kinda funny seeing Gachiakuta's figures and remember how it won a Next Manga Award in the category of "Global Special Prize." So its not too much of a stretch to say in Japan Gachiakuta is still pretty punk and underground and the value is definitely in that global market. Though I have to have a bit of laugh now a how much that's been a pretty hit or miss effort.

So Gachiakuta is a success story, but its that sort of "A first party Nintendo switch game sold over a million units" type of success. That's good, but its not like making those Mario numbers.

Conclusion

So I'm sure you're asking what was the point of all of this? Why did you spend so much time of comparing the rises of two shonen action series that outside of probably their hardcore cheering section don't really think about their success stories?

Well to me, I'm of the belief that the ultimate goal for a mangaka (And really any creative professional) at the end of the day is to be able to tell their story, entertain people, and make a comfortable living while doing so. The end goal may be the same for many, but the paths to how we get there can vary greatly. If you made it there by blockbuster success or by underground hit. And the fact that those paths can be so varied by factors ranging from independent social media movements and the actions of making a piece of media even available for an audience you want to reach.

When writing this piece, I really got the sense of just how much bigger manga in particular is effecting the more broader ani/manga subgenre. Its not just that thing where only the best of the best we're getting English translation posted on scan sites, we've reached a point where now a global audience can have a series in their reach. Yet their reach varies.

We still don't have the chance to submit surveys in jump and we still don't have physical volumes of manga printed around the same time so we can take into account global sales, but we can hashtag. We can share these on live streams. We can have our own grassroots efforts that are actually having something resembling an effects on the choices of Japan. All of this change in practically a decade.

Will Gachiakuta and Kagurabachi go onto to be pillers of the anime and manga community? Mmm maybe. Their fans are super passionate and the great thing about fans is even though they can be loud, they are the ones helping make new fans. They're the ones making the fan art and fan fictions and reddit posts. For all we know when they get anime they'll pop off harder than before. Or maybe they'll get a bunch of normies who don't get or like them and will tell you how its secretly never good.

Still its interesting to see how despite these two series having so much of the same ground, both of their roads were so different. And that maybe you can't control how things will turn out in the world of social media and corporate management. Sometimes all you can do is your best and stand on your own merits and the people will find you.

Whether they run for 200 chapters each or 700 chapters each or anything down the middle. Gachiakuta and Kagurabachi, here's to you're accomplishments now and here's to many more successful years down your respective roads.

Anyway folks that's my time. I hope you enjoyed this think piece. If you do please drop a like or reblog. It'll really tell me if you're interested in seeing more content like this. And maybe I can share more and more about this industry that I'm passionate about.

[daemadness]

Hi! Now I don’t really know what has gotten into me but I’ve kind of jumpstarted a Die Ärzte hyperfixation about a year ago and have been eating up all DÄ related material I could find.

Now that means that I have also dived *deep* into the fandom. And by deep I mean: no content was too unhinged, no hurdle too absurd, no taboo too taboo (*coughs in ancient livejournal FuB fanfic groups and the cursed explicit fanart on animexx*).

There is just one major problem: being “only” 20 years old, even though I am a native German speaker, most of the interesting “secret” fandom lore is or has become unavailable to me.

I have had small joys like finding out I could still read the old Prawda magazines online for example, but with the DÄ board tragically having been shut down last year and a lot of links on livejournal with “new photos” or interviews leading to long since defunct websites, it’s a little hard to keep an overview.

So far that has not caused too much of a hinderance though. I can still sleep pretty soundly at night even with the for example tons of potential photos I might have missed out on seeing (despite the fact that it is tragic to me don’t get me wrong).

Now there is one (1) exception though that has been driving me I N S A N E for about a month now, because no matter where I searched I could find zero information on it and I’ve never had this happen to me before.

I skimmed most of the Meerschweinchen and Das Buch Ä (I have ADHD too, so reading long texts is kinda hard for me) but as far as I saw it, neither of them mentioned anything about that either.

Now this is where you come into play! *affectionatly points at you* Most DÄ fan accounts I know have been around for maybe 1 to 5 years max, but YOU are what I would call one of the few remaining monoliths of the ever so strong fandom “elders” (I mean this with the deepest affection from the bottom of my heart, I hope you don’t misunderstand me)

Anyways, I’m sorry, I keep babbling on and on, let me not waste your time any further:

On Livejournal there was one user who in 2008 made a funny little adorable fan comic on Bela’s well interesting behavior on stage with Los Helmstedt and Wayne in particular and how she found it unacceptable as “Farin is obviously his true love”. It was obviously just a very silly, adorable fan comic that I feel like many fangirls could and can relate too, BUT, the thing that caught me off guard was ONE LINE in one specific panel in particular, where the author’s self-insert curses Farin out. And that was (see attached image 1):

“UND DU! Ich werde dir nie verzeihen das du 95 gekniffen hast, als Bela dich küssen wollte!”

So I legitimately sat there in silence with my mouth agape wondering if I had just read that correctly. Don’t get me wrong, I of course know that FuB have kissed on stage multiple times before, but the way she phrased that instance in particular somehow made me get 100% more intrigued and excited because WHAT DO YOU MEAN?! And afterwards the author bickered with some other fangirls in the comments of her comic and THEY ALL SEEMED TO KNOW WHAT INSTANCE SHE WAS REFERRING TO, BUT NO ONE GAVE ANY ADDITIONAL CONTEXT (see attached image 2)

Now Mädness, you don’t know me, but I live in Germany, it is 1:13 am as I am writing this, tomorrow I have a free day from Uni, I have a stubborn tendency to want to know everything about my hyperfixations and I am angrily staring at the ceiling because no amount of google research can solve this mystery for me; so to quote the first Star Wars movie “You are my only hope!”. Please within your magnificent knowledge of this band and its fandom culture, can you explain to me what that thing was all about/what the story behind it is?

In any case, thank you for taking the time to read this rant whenever it may find you. Remember, Rod loves you <3

Heyyyy, thanks for the ask and kind words! I'm always happy to help, and you have DEFINITELY come to the right place! :D Even tho I don't feel particularly like a fandom elder - true that I have been here since 2009, but I literally have been here "only" since 2009 because I'm not from any of the German-speaking countries, so I didn't hear about them until that late. But I am definitely aiming to be like, the fandom archivist (or one of them), would love to found a website where I could just post printed interviews (I managed to save majority of them to my files before dä Archiv went down for good a couple of years ago), photos and link and keep a list of video interviews. I have already quite many reuploaded videos on my youtube channel because I started hoarding the videos, which was A REALLY GOOD DECISION because now I already have so many videos that otherwise would have become lost media.

Okay now to what your ask is actually all about: I am 100% certain that they are referring to the Absolut Live from 1995, where during Zu spät, Bela walked to Farin and tried to kiss him, and for a moment it looked like Farin was going to let him do so too, but then suddenly realized what was going on, started laughing and then this happened:

I keep going back to video regularly, trying to analyze it and see if I have missed something the last time, but haven't gathered anything new recently. To me it looks like Bela's mic touched Farin's face and it suddenly hit him that Bela wasn't aiming for a normal kiss-on-the-cheek but something else. Especially back then he used to shy out quite easily even around Bela if something like that happened, and he in general always does this self-defence laugh which happens in this video as well :D

Also oh well, LiveJournal days were something else. That's where I started, I don't think the english-speaking dä slash community is accessable to anyone who didn't join it back then as it's been dead for over a decade now. I still have my access there and it's such a goldmine, so much so I wish I knew how to archive every single post there (at least those that are not other people's fanfics) without having to manually browse through and copypaste the contents of everything myself. There's posts starting from like 2005 or something so there's A LOT OF STUFF, even if most links are dead and broken by now. And thanata-phaemo was the best artist! They definitely inspired me with my own drawings a lot, they did lots and lots of FUB fanart (some of that might still be up on Deviantart) and I remember always looking at those drawings and wishing that I could draw like they do, cos I had so many interesting and fluffy FUB scenarios in my head that I did not know how to translate into visual form. Nowadays I can somewhat do that, but still not perfectly as it would require an art style I have been trying to build for years but which is still today impossible for me to do.

But yeah, I hope this answered your question! I know the feel when there is something in written form and it creates all kinds of images in one's head, and you're just dying to know what it REALLY was about. Sometimes it actually sounds better than what was reality. I remember years ago finding a post on that said dä slash community on LJ, it was someone asking if anyone remembered how "Bela and Farin made out on TV in 2003 or so?" and that and all the comments made it sound like it was something different than what's usual them. For years I have kept searching for this video and wishing that it would pop up, and I think that last year it actually did. Tho, it was way more chill which is normal and you can't really see much, but it was still quite an interesting find and immediately made me feel like my search has ended, and I have finally come across this interview people talked about and which has been haunting me for 15 years. It's a nice feeling. (And if you're curious about the clip, I included it in my latest FUB video, which is on my youtube but also linked on a post here and tagged under FUB! :D)

[clannfearrunt]

basically I want to be super careful about canon info because 1.) i do think it is best that people are on more or less the same page about what the canon, official info is so we don't rip each other's throats out about shit that isn't even correct, but!

Back when Octo Expansion was new. Someone machine translated Dedf1sh's official introduction post. Because Japanese grammar makes it so the gender of the subject is often difficult or even impossible to glean from the sentence itself, the machine translation spit out multiple pronoun sets for Ded... Even though Ded's first intro tweet actually did explicitly refer to her as 彼女, pretty much the closest thing to she/hering someone as you'll often get outside of there being instances of gendered titles and such.

I think I recall that particular mixup was cleared up pretty quickly among the initial group of dedicated tumblr Dedf1sh Fans?, but nonetheless it became a very popular fan interpretation to have them be some flavor of nonbinary (myself included! nb Dedf1sh central babey!).

But of course not everyone is going to be part of the initial group of Dedf1sh Fans, so I think there were some people who got confused as to the official situation? Some people got asks berating them for using she/her for Dedf1sh in any context (at the same time as people were also getting harassed for using they/them... truly a fucking time of the fandom).

Cut to when the Octo Expansion artbook, the Haikara Walker came out. Since I was still very excited and not yet a jaded ass, I liveblogged a lot of my reading from it. When I got to the Splatbands info section, I used exclusively she/her for Dedf1sh since that was the explicitly stated official gender situation at the time. And I got weird aggressive asks about that too! "Oh it's pretty sus that you've switched to exclusively gendering them as female" bitch it's always been the case from goddamn day 1! Of course I'm going to use the officially established pronoun set when talking about official information. It is not my fault if you don't care enough about the situation to go check what's canon vs fanon, but you can't go harassing people over it.

Anyways the structure of this post fell apart as I unearthed memories but I hope this explains why I'm so fucking. Jaded. About people jumping the gun with regards to gender in Splatoon

[unknown-lifeform]

really random ask but i also saw someone on reddit mention that em dashes are a sign of ai writing, though it was specifically in the context of fake stories on threads like aita

it made me wonder about how often the average person really uses em dashes when they write a post vs when they write a story. or even like getting an actual em dash instead of just two hyphens. it was odd to reevaluate posts that seemed genuine but in hindsight were...too well written? for lack of a better way to describe it. like typical marks of good writing actually seemed strange bc authors generally put in a lot of effort to have their ideas so polished which reddit users typically wouldnt do.

of course this could totally be different from what you saw, but i'm curious about your thoughts as an active writer

In posts it's certainly harder to get proper punctuation but I wouldn't call any post with em dashes AI writing. My laptop keyboard doesn't have an em dash but with phones you can put them in with no issue, and while a lot of people might just got for a regular hyphen someone might prefer the em dash instead. Sure, you'd have to be a bit of a sticker for punctuation, but it's not impossible imo. I know people who are very particular about their punctuation, and I also have my own things (I'm the person who will use proper capitalization in text messages because it just irks me otherwise)

In general I'm always a bit skeptical of people who say posts are fake because they are "too well written", which is pretty common on reddit I've seen. Sometimes the writing does feel exaggerated but at the same time who knows who is writing said post. Someone whose job requires a lot of writing (writers, journalists, editors, so on and so forth) might write "better" than what you'd expect from an average post simply because of habit. The same goes for when someone says a word is too hard to just appear randomly in text therefore AI put it there, some people just use "harder" words for whatever reason

I also need to point out that while generative AI is a plague, there are also other possible uses of AI. Any tool used to correct the grammar of something is technically AI, and I've seen multiple instances of people on reddit saying they ran their posts through AI because English is their second language and they wanted to be sure it made sense. Are some of them lying and it's all generative AI? Probably, but I'm from a non-English speaking country and I work in a setting where we have to write a lot of reports in English. AI doesn't catch all mistakes but it can fix a lot of things that you wouldn't know are wrong if you're not fluent. I personally prefer not to use anything more complex than the default grammar checker in Word, but I'm also more confident in my English than many other people and that still doesn't make me immune to making mistakes sometimes

Basically what I'm saying is a lot of people on reddit make shit up for fun and profit but for me personally "writing too well" is not even close to proof of generative AI, and frankly sometimes I worry about how the AI scare will impact real writers

[galacticnova3]

I think the main reason why the audience reaction to Iru is so off is that most of his deeply unpleasant traits (like his bigotry, closemindedness, stomping over boundaries, general aura of Uncomfortable Guy who’s getting waaay too close to you for comfort, etc.) are more often told to us rather than shown, esp within the context people typically see him in, so they tend to come across more as informed attributes. You’re an excellent writer and I adore your work, but I feel like in certain instances you tend to hold back with him a little - the grotesquery of his behaviour and dialogue should speak for themselves, rather than just other characters telling us how much he sucks. I know part of this is intentional, because Iru consciously tries his best to keep his more unsavoury traits under wraps, but I think there’s plenty of ways to let it slip through more often while still maintaining that subtlety.

The main issue is that there's a big difference between Iru speaking to others in person versus Iru speaking to others over the internet, which so far has been the primary way I write him since I'm bad at setting up actual rps. Typing something out gives him far more opportunities to think "wait I'm saying the quiet part out loud" compared to him actually speaking with someone, especially now that he operates at organic speeds; he can still process things at an above average rate to the point of outpacing his ability to type.

Iru is extremely manipulative because he always wants to get people to look at and treat him the way he looks at and treats himself. He doesn't care(that much) if they only do it if he lies to them. This exact behavior was just talked about, actually— he doesn't give a shit about respecting identities beyond his own, but recognizes that wording his complaints as if he does will make himself look better. Plus, trying to draw attention to someone else supposedly being close-minded, in his mind, takes attention away from his own bigotry. That whole interaction in itself was an example of subtle ways he is a shitty person.

The manner in which he is a bad person is also just different than how it used to be. He isn't physical in the way he used to be because he has no reason to attack other ships, and as a mimic he isn't cold and callous and efficient in how he goes about hunting the same way Lon is. Iru is a people person, owing strongly to his history as an Umbramaker. He's talkative, he wants attention, he wants connection— ironically that's the reason he decided not to out Lon or stop trying to get with them. They, even if not honestly, indulged him for a while, because they did not understand or care about his opinions and behavior the way other people had, and he was desperate because he had nobody because other people wouldn't just accept his behavior the way Lon did/does.

There's also just the fact that like. Last time I wrote something that really showed off how genuinely awful he was in a non-rp setting, like seriously poured hours into it... Next to nobody seemed to actually read it. Not on here or on Discord, even when I brought attention to it multiple times hoping to get folks to check it out. The kind people who did read it didn't say anything about it that really meant anything in particular. I can't recall a single reaction that was specific to it, positive OR negative. Whenever I get useful or memorable feedback I keep it, but I have nothing from that time. The one person who expressed interest also kind of stabbed me in the back after blaming me for the resentment they allowed to build up instead of just talking to me, which doesn't help and is also far beyond the scope of this post.

Like, I love getting key smashes and OOOOOOO and emojis as much as the next guy, but they don't encourage me like actual feedback does. It really demotivated me a lot to the point that I've actually long since deleted what I'd written and haven't really had it in me to try again. Why bother? Why put the time and effort in if nobody is going to care about it any more than people care about the easier to write shitposts or chat-based rp? If it's not going to be any more impactful to people, what's the point of spending the energy? It doesn't do me any good because I already understand he's a terrible person and don't need to write a several thousand word story about it, but if I don't have reason to think others would read those stories... Well, why would I write them?

The same thing kinda happened with Lon, too, though at least my writing there was memorable enough to lead to the "Lon hates southerners" joke. But that wasn't what I wanted the focus or takeaway to be at all, so I still failed at my goal anyways. Another reason not to invest time and energy into that kind of thing.

Now I'm unmotivated to write it because there's the evident good chance that most people won't care about it AND a risk of the people reading it being gross about it. Whether directly or by intentionally misinterpreting it. For fuck's sake people have made [REDACTED] jokes about him and Isi. There's just not enough genuine interest that's been expressed to outweigh the fact that I don't want to deal with more of that, or violations of my blacklist, etc.

Maybe I'll try again eventually, but as things stand I just don't have the confidence to expect it to make a difference.

[vickyvicarious]

It looks to me like Jack began feeling distanced from Lucy even before he looked at her tomb to find her (unbeknownst to him) as a vampire. His descriptions of her were kinda getting cold and clinical while she was dying and becoming halfway through vampiric...

Yes, I agre there's a bit of a pattern there! I actually collected a bunch of moments of it happening earlier, but they're together with a very spoilery post. Here, I'll copy/paste the Lucy ones below for people who don't want the spoilers.

There on the bed, seemingly in a swoon, lay poor Lucy, more horribly white and wan-looking than ever. Even the lips were white, and the gums seemed to have shrunken back from the teeth, as we sometimes see in a corpse after a prolonged illness. Van Helsing raised his foot to stamp in anger, but the instinct of his life and all the long years of habit stood to him, and he put it down again softly. “Quick!” he said. “Bring the brandy.” I flew to the dining-room, and returned with the decanter. He wetted the poor white lips with it, and together we rubbed palm and wrist and heart. He felt her heart, and after a few moments of agonising suspense said:— “It is not too late.”

I find Jack’s sudden detachment in this scene so interesting. I think he might have done this before to an extent, describing physical symptoms almost as a separate phenomenon rather than a part of the person. He certainly spoke of Lucy rather formally in some medical contexts (“Patient improved” etc.). But it’s especially striking here how quickly he goes from humanizing language to speaking about her almost as an object. It happens right when he describes her lips and teeth - which holds a lot of significance vampirically.

Jack obviously isn’t looking at Lucy thinking she’s a vampire. But he outright says that the look of her teeth/gums reminds him of a corpse. She looks dead. And seeing that, he describes her more clinically, seeking to distance himself emotionally from the sight. He can’t completely do it (that’s how we get “the poor white lips”, still sympathetic) but it’s not until he gets to Lucy’s heart - and how it is still beating - that he returns to saying “her”.

I found several more instances of this happening with Lucy as well, including what seems like a trend almost of Jack starting to key in to her more vampiric moments over time.

On 18 September, only briefly:

Whilst asleep she looked stronger, although more haggard, and her breathing was softer; her open mouth showed the pale gums drawn back from the teeth, which thus looked positively longer and sharper than usual; when she woke the softness of her eyes evidently changed the expression, for she looked her own self, although a dying one.

Then as she is dying on the 20th it happens more, and specifically in multiple instances when she was more vampiric:

Lucy was breathing somewhat stertorously, and her face was at its worst, for the open mouth showed the pale gums. Her teeth, in the dim, uncertain light, seemed longer and sharper than they had been in the morning. In particular, by some trick of the light, the canine teeth looked longer and sharper than the rest. I sat down by her, and presently she moved uneasily. […] And then insensibly there came the strange change which I had noticed in the night. Her breathing grew stertorous, the mouth opened, and the pale gums, drawn back, made the teeth look longer and sharper than ever. […] I kept my eyes fixed on Lucy, as did Van Helsing, and we saw a spasm as of rage flit like a shadow over her face; the sharp teeth champed together. Then her eyes closed, and she breathed heavily.

When he visits her grave with van Helsing on the 27th he starts by talking about her emotionally then cutting off when he gets to her lips, and after that point doesn’t describe her corpse with humanizing language at all for the rest of that entry:

She was, if possible, more radiantly beautiful than ever; and I could not believe that she was dead. The lips were red, nay redder than before; and on the cheeks was a delicate bloom. […] “Are you convinced now?” said the Professor in response, and as he spoke he put over his hand, and in a way that made me shudder, pulled back the dead lips and showed the white teeth. “See,” he went on, “see, they are even sharper than before. With this and this"—and he touched one of the canine teeth and that below it—” […] He was looking intently at the face of the dead woman, raising the eyelids and looking at the eyes, and once more opening the lips and examining the teeth.

And by 29 September, after seeing her in action he speaks of her pretty firmly as a thing, at least until Arthur has finished staking her:

Then she turned, and her face was shown in the clear burst of moonlight and by the lamp, which had now no quiver from Van Helsing’s iron nerves. Never did I see such baffled malice on a face; and never, I trust, shall such ever be seen again by mortal eyes. The beautiful colour became livid, the eyes seemed to throw out sparks of hell-fire, the brows were wrinkled as though the folds of the flesh were the coils of Medusa’s snakes, and the lovely, blood-stained mouth grew to an open square, as in the passion masks of the Greeks and Japanese. If ever a face meant death—if looks could kill—we saw it at that moment. […] She seemed like a nightmare of Lucy as she lay there; the pointed teeth, the bloodstained, voluptuous mouth—which it made one shudder to see—the whole carnal and unspiritual appearance, seeming like a devilish mockery of Lucy’s sweet purity. […] The Thing in the coffin writhed; and a hideous, blood-curdling screech came from the opened red lips. The body shook and quivered and twisted in wild contortions; the sharp white teeth champed together till the lips were cut, and the mouth was smeared with a crimson foam. […] And then the writhing and quivering of the body became less, and the teeth seemed to champ, and the face to quiver. Finally it lay still. […] There, in the coffin lay no longer the foul Thing that we had so dreaded and grown to hate that the work of her destruction was yielded as a privilege to the one best entitled to it, but Lucy as we had seen her in her life, with her face of unequalled sweetness and purity.

Even if he doesn't realize what he's doing, it feels like it happens enough to say there's something there. Him sensing the change and not liking it, without realizing at first why.

[goldentigerfestival]

so I finally found a subbed version of PS3 Vesperia recently (what the DE was ported from), and that means I am now properly enabled to further make my arguments LOL. basically since the DE text is still in English and there are no subs for what's actually being spoken in the JP audio, it's harder for me to make some points since sometimes people will just listen to audio in JP but not really understand what's going on and have to rely on the English text (which again is localized and not genuinely translated, and in a lot of major cases with Vesperia, it's pretty egregiously bad).

idk how many posts I'll end up making about the bigger changes but I do want to cover some of the things that rubbed me the wrong way with unnecessary and even harmful to Yuri's character changes.

for instance, Yuri has a skit with Estelle that was heavily altered in the dub, originally talking about how he can't find himself being grateful to someone like Raven for showing them how to sneak out of the castle. his reasoning is basically that Raven is shady and he's not sure he should be grateful to someone like that, and is confused as to why Estelle would be so grateful when she doesn't even know him (because in his mind, he knows the guy feels somewhat shady from meeting him and isn't sure he wants to trust a guy with those vibes).

in the dub they just kinda... make him sound like an ungrateful jerk and not so much because he's not sure he wants to trust Raven. the dub skit doesn't make it sound like it's an issue of his with Raven specifically and that he just generally doesn't feel grateful for the aid (and that in general one shouldn't feel grateful for aid like this), which gives off a really wrong impression of him that doesn't hold up throughout the game.

Yuri wasn't wholly ungrateful for the gesture itself, but because of who it came from - and let's face it, getting that info from a guy in jail who had to be taken out by the commandant himself wouldn't look good in the eyes of an average citizen.

the dub really hurt Yuri's character in a lot of ways, but ever since I'd first played the game on the 360 yeaaars ago, that dubbed skit rubbed me the wrong way even before I knew the JP audio and now that I can show others the full JP context (again, can't really do that with the western release because the dialogue is still written in English so some people can hear the audio but if they don't understand it, the message they take away from it is still whatever is written in the localization) I really want to talk about some of the more damaging changes (in particular about Yuri because he got the absolute worst brunt of it). the skit is one example of a lot of weird changes that make no sense and unfortunately one of many that changed the entire meaning behind something Yuri meant/was doing.

there are a lot of weird cases of them just adding in entire sentences for no reason that don't really make sense or fit, but I probably won't cover those or at least in much detail. it's some of the bigger things I want to talk about because I feel like there's a huge disconnect in a lot of cases between western fandom Yuri and actual Yuri, and western fandom Yuri is partially if not mostly a result of the dub just yeeting entire aspects of his character out the window at the speed of light because dear heavens we simply can't have a cool adult man show a range of emotion evidently.

...on that note it's very wild to me how often they remove all traces of people calling Yuri an idiot. Karol had multiple but only got like one in in the dub. yeah.

[ovwechoes]

Do you have any rules for making requests? Stuff like characters or subjects you will and won't write about or certain contexts you won't write certain characters in? How many characters can we ask about per request? Will we get less content if we ask for more characters? And what about nsfw stuff? Any particular leanings or restrictions for that? Feel free to mention any thing else. Sorry about the all questions. Just want to make sure before doing anything. Thanks and have a great day!

Rules & FAQ Thank you for the ask! I've been wanting to do a rules post to outline what I write for and what I don't, and other things so that there's no confusion with people. So I'll use this ask as my rules page for now, and edit as needed.

As a general rule, I delete requests if you spam your ask multiple times on separate days - I understand if you're inpatient, but please give me time and rushing doesn't help anything. If you want to know where I'm at with your request, you're always free to send an ask asking or DM me personally. I don't take offence to asking, but spamming my inbox with those things won't make me work faster.

Characters I do/don't write: I'm happy to write for any of the overwatch characters, but in a romantic way and with a human reader, I won't write for Winston, Wrecking Ball, or Orisa (since she's canonically like 5). With them, I'd only feel comfortable writing for them in a platonic/general sense, nothing romantic or sexual with human readers. I won't write Lena Oxton/Tracer with a male reader, or Soldier:76 with a female reader either in romantic or sexual contexts. Also, I specialise in writing female characters, but I'm honestly happy to write for any gender/sexuality, with any type of reader as long as it doesn't clash with the above info.

Subjects I do/don't write: I avoid writing anything involving proship, incest, domestic abuse, and paedophilia. It's something I will always avoid, and I'm not lean about this. I will write for deeper subjects like mental health, drug abuse, stalking (as long as it's not a one sided situation), that sort of thing and use themes/tw/cw sections where available. For example, I won't write yandere if it's one sided or just the reader/character doing it to the other. Whereas, I'm happy to write it as a ‘matched their freak’ sort of situation where they're both obsessive with each other. I also won't write for the following kinks when it comes to nsfw requests (for my own comfort): cnc/consensual non-consensual, daddy kink/ddlg, thigh crushing, sounding and age play in general. I delete requests involving these things, and would appreciate if these topics were avoided when it comes to requesting things.

How Many Characters Per Headcanon Request? I'm happy to write for about 6 characters in 1 headcanon request, or 2 ships in one headcanon request. It helps me keep track of what I'm writing for and doesn't mud the waters too much. However, with fanfic, one shot or drabble requests I'll only do one at a time. I'll separate the posts if there's requests for more than one in an ask, and link the post that's split from the ask in the response. If you want an organisation, like Talon or Overwatch, written for as a headcanon request, that's the only time I'm really flexible with the rules. I'm happy to write for polyamorous characters/ships as well, but in this instance the maximum ship amount for a request of any nature would be 4. As for content, I aim to give about 6-7 headcanons per post, but sometimes if I don't have enough inspo I'll write for less, but it wont be any less than 4-5. I also have question or non question options for my hc posts, so you're free to ask for either if you'd prefer that. 

NSFW: General rules With NSFW stuff, I'm happy to write for anything involving it as long as it doesn't clash with what I'm comfortable writing. But the characters I'm not comfortable writing with NSFW are anything involving Orisa, Wrecking Ball or Winston, paedophilia, assault or rape, incest or proship. I won't write for any underage characters as well in a sexual light. I also won't write for the following kinks when it comes to nsfw requests (for my own comfort): cnc/consensual non-consensual, daddy kink/ddlg, thigh crushing, sounding and age play in general. I delete requests involving these things, and would appreciate if these topics were avoided when it comes to requesting things. That's basically all my rules with that section.

Don't apologise about the questions I totally get it! I'm the same way and I've been wanting to properly outline these things for a while now, so I appreciate you asking thoroughly. Thank you again for the ask anon!

[andromedaexists]

Writeblr Positivity Tag

I was tagged by the amazing @betweenthetimeandsound! Thank you!

What motivates you to write?

My friends! Every single person who has told me that they want to see Call Me Icarus come to life motivates me. Every time I get a message from Feral or Crypt or Nats or Creme or anyone that tells me that they love the characters I create and the stories I tell motivates me to keep writing.

A line/short snippet of your writing that you are most proud/happy of. If not, maybe share a line of someone else's work you love (just please credit them):

ooooh there's a few pieces that I'm really proud of. If I had to choose just one there's this specific line in Incorrect Eyes that really does not make sense out of context, but I feel like I did a damn good job of portraying panic and anxiety in it (i bolded it so it will stand out):

My phone was always going off, messages from teammates, friends, family that I just couldn’t answer. Didn’t know how to answer. “Are you okay?” I didn’t know, I couldn’t feel anything other than numbness and fear. “Where have you been?” Hiding. Hiding and working and sinking further into the pit of despair and paranoia. “Your friends are wondering where you are.” I wondered that too, where was I? What was I doing? What were these words around me? Why were there eyes everywhere? I didn’t know what to do, I felt like I lost my mind. I couldn’t sleep, couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe without being watched. I needed to escape and I did not know how.

Which OC makes you smile every time you think/ talk about them and what are they like?

Icarus! I grin so big when I talk about him!! He is a rat bastard and I have so so so much fun torturing him!

Like, I literally light up when I get to infodump about him to people, he is a special interest of mine at this point. He is an emotionally constipated piece of shit that refuses to get over his dual god and inferiority complexes and he is my everything

What process of writing do you enjoy the most?

I really enjoy putting things together. Like, you just finished all your plotting and writing and light revisions, time to run over it one time from front to back and put everything together. That's what I like the most

What part of writing do you think you are the best at? (Yes stroke your own ego it's okay)

hhhhhhh that's a question. I'm actually feeling pretty shit about my writing right now, but if I had to choose I think I'm pretty darn good at descriptions. Like, I can absolutely get you put into a room down to the smell of that room and the dingy off-white stain in the corner lol

What is something in the writeblr community that is most enjoyable?

I really enjoy the people. Like, the tag games come and go, the questions are more off than on, but the people? We are always here and always sharing parts of ourselves and out writing. Everytime @cream-and-tea's snippets of Pallas cross my dash I get giddy, I love seeing @isherwoodj's work (especially when Doc is involved) too! I just love the community and the friends I've made, if that makes sense

A writing tool/device you use that helps you with writing? (It could be speech to text, a writing program etc)

Scrivener for sure, like being able to organize my WIP exactly how I want it to be organized and not have to deal with a huge ass document is amazing! I also love that I can very easy rearrange the order of things and have multiple drafts open without having to have multiple instances of a program open!

I also heavily rely on speech to text, I have a bad habit of small typos that most programs wont catch (i.e. my instead of me, by instead of be type stuff) The only way I've found to reliably catch these is through speech to text since my eyes will just jump right over them!

A piece of worldbuilding that you like in your own story? (It could be the magic system, a particular place in the story, a law etc)

I really love incorporating mythology into my worldbuilding. It doesn't matter what my WIP is, it will have mythological significance. It's obvious to see in CMI, but it really shines in Desecrate. A lot of things in that WIP have heavy mythological significance (such as the characters names, Christian "Kit" Amadeus Michaels and Adonai)

What piece of advice would you say to encourage others to write if they are having a rough patch?

Take care of yourself, there cannot be a book written by you without you.

Tag some people whose works you love/have been your biggest supporters:

ooohhhh there's so many!!

Let's start with the Shit Show: @lockejhaven @365runesoftheamalgamations @ghost-town-story @crypticcodexcreations @smol-feralgremlin @inkspellangel and @authoralexharvey!

There's also @cream-and-tea @isherwoodj @flowerprose @howlingbreeze @cljordan-imperium and writingpotato (who left us, RIP we love you) here on tumblr!

And some new mentions that I found on twitter who have shown a lot of love for me so far: Clanky, Doom (who is here @doom-inique-writes hi doom!), Kaye (also here, hi @marsadler!!!), Tyler, Em, Gabe, and @wickedwitchwritesstuff!!!

There are so many more, but I love each and every one of you so so much and only have so much room to write people here <3

As far as tagging to do this, I think I've tagged enough people lmaooo, anyone who wants to answer these questions is more than free to!!

[cynicallarrie]

Another example of that is Louis saying “obviously” being interpreted as being sarcastic when he was talking about people leaning into conspiracies. Wether he was lying to an extent or not, I’ve seen enough videos of Louis talking to figure out “obviously” is just a word that frequently shows up in his speech and seldom in a sarcastic way. People try to use his body language as a justification for this interpretation, but as I said, it’s easy to take what he says in a certain way due to bias.

Yes, he does say 'obviously' in a non-sarcastic way often. I've considered this before when I've gone back to watch that interview. But... he did two important things in that video when he said 'obviously': he lowered his voice, and he said 'obviously' twice in a manner that would feel unnatural unless it was sarcastic. Plus, throughout the entire video he looked like he didn't give a shit, and he looked like he was about to laugh multiple times throughout. So, sorry, but I don't agree with this one at all.

Am I saying that it was sarcastic, 100% and without a shadow of a doubt? No. Because I'm not Louis.

However, you can still check boxes for body language, tone of voice, and word choice in order to make an assumption, and if there are more cues for it being sarcasm vs. it being genuine, then I am going to take the stance that it's more likely to be sarcasm.

You don't have to agree. You can believe what you want on certain aspects of Larry, and so can I. Some things might have been misinterpreted by the fandom at large, but keep in mind we have only a little to go off of. It's not that big of a deal if it turns out we misinterpreted a few things; that's bound to happen anyway.

In a recent Dan and Phil video on their gaming channel, they reacted to old videos, and, in one particular instance, they explained how a moment where Phil fell on top of Dan (which had been discussed by their fandom as being romantic) was actually just Phil catching Dan by surprise. (For context if you don't know who they are: they were youtubers who were thought to be in a relationship for ~a decade, to which they denied it throughout that ~decade, and then only recently did they come out and admit that they in fact were in a relationship). So, like I said, it happens. I could be wrong about the 'obviously' moment, but, as it stands, this is how I see it.

I remember when that video came out, and I watched it before I saw any of the fandom's reactions, and I remember immediately feeling like he was being sarcastic. I didn't expect it either. I feared that interview when Dan Wootton came on twitter and said he was going to ask Louis about Larry and end the rumors once and for all. I expected the worst. I expected Louis to get upset at us. I did not expect any sarcasm, so I don't think that I was just 'seeing things.' Again, I could be wrong, but I will wait for Louis to correct us on our possible misinterpretations in the future, if he ever decides to do so.

[yoki-loves-stars]

In addition (tma S4 spoilers)

That would mean that Jon in S1 is the least human he's ever been.

He had friends before joining the Institute, and in research he was at least on good terms with Tim and Sasha. But in S1 he tries to completely cut off everyone, maintaining only professional relationships. Obviously, there are a lot of reasons why he does that, but that's not what I want to talk about right now.

What I do want to talk about is how while he's losing his humanity physically, he gains more humanity on that inner level. He connects and reconnects with people, he learns to trust, he learns to love people again. The more he loses his humanity the more human he gets.

And yet S1 Jon would never question his humanity, while post S2 Jon doesn't believe he's human at all.

This physical loss of humanity is also portrayed in him losing his ribs.

While I am aware that the translation of the Bible isn't perfect and "Adam's rib" is more likely to mean "Adam's side" or "half", it would be pointless to deny the impact of this particular translation on the way we view and symbolise ribs in media. There are many symbolic interpretations of Adam's rib, but I like to think of it as one's humanity. And S4 is filled to the brim with Jon's loss of physical humanity and it's consequences, so that interpretation seems very fitting in the context.

If we add the "side" translation to our interpretation, then we get Jon having two sides of humanity, and losing one of them.

Another way of viewing it could be Jon exposing his heart and thus his desires. In S4 there are multiple instances of Jon wanting to be "selfish". (In reality his selfishness is in most cases a basic desire for a normal calm and happy life for himself and the ones he cares about, him expressing his humanity through addiction and enjoyment (taking live statements) or in some cases his desire to for once feel powerful)

So what we could see is by losing his physical humanity, he was able to express himself more emotionally. By losing ribs, that were hiding his heart and serving to it as protection, it got exposed to the world. (yes he probably didn't actually lose ribs in front of his heart, but that's just a metaphor)

And again it's probably completely the other way around for Gertrude. We don't know much about young Gertrude, but we do know, that there's a possibility her entire journey was started by her desire for revenge, and, we could assume, she was more human in her youth. Thus, both Jon and Gertrude both lost some sort of their humanity while being The Archivists: one lost it physically, and the other - emotionally.

Not to mention, one of her first marks were her lungs – yet another organ protected by our ribcage – burning.

I really love this parallel between Gertrude and Jon on humanity (vague tma spoilers)

Gertrude "you were the one so insistent on staying human" Robinson lost everything that makes her human.

Sure, she never became a proper avatar and technically stayed human, but she didn't allow herself to love, to trust, to connect, because every time she did, she'd lose something and someone, so she became cold, she built walls, she took any risk, she'd go as far as she needed to, if it meant success.

It doesn't help that all of her actions lead to other people, servants and avatars to either despise and fear her or hold a great respect towards her. Either way it gets her what she wants.

You could forever argue about what kind of person all of that makes her, yet she was a person. Good, flawed or bad, she was a person and she was human. At least in the most technical most polished way.

But to say she never cared? That would be completely wrong. She held a cold demeanor and a strong confident facade, but deep down she cared.

To speak with such fondness of someone you've never properly interacted with? Is it not human? Yes, Agnes was her anchor, but still. There is something so warm about the way Gertrude talks about her, is curious about her.

To worry about the effects and ethics of your power, to refuse to embrace it, wouldn't that too be human?

And Gerry was probably the last person she genuinely loved and cared for. Gertrude's last tie to humanity, her last anchor and her last reason.

So when he died, when there was nothing left, her tasks, her goals became just some mundane things to take care of. Yes, for the greater good, for the sake of the world, but after you lose everything to care for, to come back to, what's saving the world you already grew so cold towards? Is it really driven by love, dedication, loyalty or connection? Or is it driven by revenge at best, and muscle memory at worst, simply because there is nothing left, but yet another task in your life?

Gertrude, undoubtedly, was human in this very technical, almost artificial way, and she tried her best to remove every ounce of humanity she had, even if she couldn't truly succeed.

On the other hand, Jon stayed so human, it's killing him. Sure, he became an avatar, he stopped being human in a literal sense, but he loves, he cares about people. He has anchors, he has people he mourns, he has people he loves, he has a reason. And that at the same time gives him power and weakens him enormously.

Him choosing to lose his humanity, to wake up, is the most human thing he could do. It's a choice to keep living, to keep fighting, to keep loving. A choice that he would regret over and over and over again as he thinks that he doesn't deserve to exist anymore, that his mere existence causes pain and suffering. And in a way it does.

So when people tell him that he's a monster he believes it. Maybe even more than they do.

It would be so much easier if he was a monster. If all the bad things he's done were driven by some power he was beneath of. If he was, he could just brush them off cause he can't help it, it's in his nature. "Is a thing evil when it simply obeys its own nature? When it embodies its nature?"

The thing is, he's not. He's not evil, he's not a monster, not a vampire, not a doll came to life, not the distortion. He did not come back wrong.

His choice to keep feeding is his own and that horrifies him so much. This choice not to starve, to keep living and to keep enjoying is a very human choice, it is not an instinct. The same way it was his choice to keep reading, to keep being involved. Yes, it's not fair. It's not a fair price for curiousity and it's not a fair price for living. But it's the reality of things.

Do you think he ever regretted setting a person free, even though that could easily kill him? Do you think that he ever regretted setting his foot into that coffin to save someone, who tried to kill him? Do you think he ever regretted choosing to save his loved one over finally getting a chance to kill the man, who ruined his life? Because I sure don't.

All of his mistakes, his sacrifices, all of his choices, all of it was caused by his humanity. Curiosity, love, hatred and fear, but never instinct. And that's what makes him human in all the ways that truly matter.

So when he finds out that there's a chance it all could be just a setup, it scares him. Because he thinks that it strips him of his humanity, of his choices and his whole life.

[falloutnewnobody]

okay wall of text that probably 3 people on this earth will understand that i should probably just keep in the drafts but idk sorry i have too much caffine and nicotine in my bloodstream to have inhibitions. massive dont wake me up spoilers ahead.

it could just be the sleep deprivation and She Wants Revenge in my earbuds but i can't stop thinking about how every little thing about Len's design actively dehumanizes him. which in the context of his constant objectification at the hands of Grace/his fans is so tragically fascinating to me. (btw i'm talking about the way Baudelaire Welch (creator of Don"t Wake me Up) designed Grace to design Len for Beautiful Lie and how that shows up in Dont Wake Me Up if that makes sense)

Like even outside of the very explicit statement that he was made to be a synthesis of 2010s vampire aesthetics (a statement that is confirmed to be 100% literal during the Grace Vitter interview) and that he is fully incapable of feeling positive emotions due to his design (also confirmed to be literal by len in chapter 5 or 6 depending on the ending) we also get little instances that showcase just how little humanity he's allowed to have. the one little thing in particular driving me insane right now is how he's consistently snarling, growling, hissing, etc. very animalistic negative reactions. it didn't click until i got this line (Len's chapter 5, in lydia's "dungeon")

but once it did i couldnt help but notice just how often this sorta thing comes up.

at first i thought this was a jab at vampire media but the more i thought about it, the more I realized that it was probably just another example of Grace stripping away Len's humanity to make him better fit the "perfect vampire idea," she wanted him to be. We already know that even most of his coping mechanisms, habits, addiction, preferences, interests, etc are programmed in to make him better match the aesthetic object he's supposed to be (something he actively brings up his complecated relationship with on multiple occasions) but something about him being robbed of what few genuine, reflexive human reactions he's physically capable of experiencing just gets to me. he doesn't get to scowl, he snarls. he doesnt get to grimace, he hisses, he doesn't get to glare, he growls.

Like a huge part of his character is how he's tormented by the core belief that noone will ever treat him as a person because he was designed to be an object for entertainment and fetishization. (A core belief that's been reaffirmed by everyone he's ever interacted with him in his perceived centuries of living until the Amnesia incedent) and thinking about just how much of his personhood has been filed away in favor of making him easier to objectify is genuinely heartwrenching.

(that also makes me wonder just how much of this is a result of grace's under the table homebrew script but that's a can of worms for another day)

toldr: the way Dont Wake Me Up handles Len's fetishization and objectification twacked me over the head with a sack of wet mice and left me bleeding out on the concrete. play it. please.

[zephthepto]

Nebula topic 3 - Card effect systems

Going into this project, I knew that without substantial variety, deck-building games can really fall flat. Making a system which allows for a very modular card effect creator is crucial for keeping this project within a manageable scope. Each card needed to have a way to interact with it, and an action it completes. Making a unique class for every single card would be absurd though, so I wanted each action to be as flexible as possible. This of course meant the systems had to be designed in a way that is very modular.

We had a plan of various ideas we may want to use, and several of them had fundamentally different interactions. For instance, some cards may be usable instantly, such as a card that heals yourself. Some cards need to select a target, like attacks. We needed a way to neatly organise all of that. 

We did a bit of brainstorming and narrowed it down to 4 main ways of letting a character interact with a card. Instant(no selection), Unit selection, Card selection, and Position selection. Each of these categories then gets split into some subcategories, each of these subcategories then has marked what inputs it must have defined, and then what outputs it produces. The idea being that an action could be defined as a Selector paired with an Effect, with the data from one automatically plugging into the other. An Effect would be a defined thing that happens.

I soon realised that this system actually turns out to be extremely limiting, it would be barely customisable and it would be hard to define any multi-step actions. This led me to rethinking how exactly an action could be defined and I decided that an action should realistically contain multiple of these modules chained together in a unique script. To do this, I designed an abstract base CardAction class that is inherited from to create every single unique card action. 

Within one of these actions, there would be a DoAction script mainly composed of all of the previously established capabilites. These would still allow for the action to be defined with a few variables, to allow the scripts to be recycled in different contexts. 

From here, the tricky part was deciding how this would interface with the actual action of using a card. The idea here isn’t too complicated; a card is chosen to be held by the player, then the selector script fires off to do the selecting that needs to happen. From there, the player can choose if they use the card or if they change their mind. If the player uses the card, the DoAction gets run and the card gets used.

With this, I tried to further expand what it could imply whenever any particular card action selector is used.

This solution was frankly getting really unnecessarily complicated, the biggest issue I was facing was that there was no way for me to guarantee what type of data was being returned from the selector, meaning I wouldn't be able to store it in any sort of proper way. This was really hard to figure out and had me taking a lot of notes trying to solve it.

It was such a non standard issue that I was really tempted to just brute force it, pushing all of the data through regardless of the selector. Which, given some more thought, made me realise that it can actually make for a very elegant solution.

What I needed to define is a card payload, the card payload can store all of the relevant data that a selector could possibly want to have saved. Not only that, but having a general payload for the completion of an action has plenty more utility as well. It can easily be one centralised location for storing the user of the card and the specific card itself. All of that data being accessed so easily would prove itself essential to creating a lot of cards down the line.

From here, it's a matter of making any given turn controller able to interface with the system. At this point I chose to actually entirely flatten down the functionality of the selectors into their main 4 categories which can be stored on the action as an enum. The actual functionality can be handled by the turn controllers themselves. This is how the player is able to use the interface to make their choices while NPCs make their own AI choices.

Developing further on this idea, I started planning out how this may flow within the rest of the Battle Manager loop, and I came up with some systems that could work very reliably. The TurnController script would then branch into preparing the card based on which selector was passed through. And each branch can be overridden based on who is calling it.

Here we also needed to define what limits are in place for the selection being done. This gets boiled down to each type of active selector having its own checklist. The checklist information is defined within the cardData, and if we were to define a unit selector card, it would contain how many units it needs to select, along with what alignment they have (ie ally, enemy)

Cards that take a selector that needs a choice will have a checklist. Eg unit selector needs to know which alignment to select, and how many to select.

Then its a matter of running the effect. Once a card has gone through the stages of preparation, the DoAction can reference any data it expects to have in the payload and can do operations on it. Now, working with this to make a few cards I quickly found myself constantly looking for where things were being held, trying to find which element contains which function. It was a mess and it needed to be organised.

This is why I designed the CardEffects helper system that allows me to do all of the functions from one centralised location. This really simplifies calling these actions. When writing a script I can just write CardEffect and then browse through all of the options it allows me to call from there.

I later visualised this to demonstrate to the team what modules they can use to plan card effects that they might want to see implemented into the game.

This includes utilities such as:

Doing attacks

Playing animations

Changing energy and movement points

Drawing cards

Selecting all battle participants

Filtering a list of units

Of course many actions include attacks, they are a fundamental part of the gameplay loop. I created a special class for defining attack data, which stores the full definition of the results of the attack. Ie damage value, damage type and status effects.

Calling these attacks may admittedly not be entirely correct, as these function as much more than just attacks but I was starting to run out of words between Attacks, Effects and Actions, along with how damage was initially the only purpose of these. Attack type can define the consequences of the attack to be entirely different. For instance setting it to Heal makes the target regenerate the specified amount, there's also shield setters which add the selected amount of Barrier to the target, either Physical or Magical. This is of course also used for normal combat terms with Physical, Magical and Chaos damage which determine which shield should block the damage before the attack hurts the target's health, or it can bypass that entirely. There's also shield breaking which can only ever deal damage to shields, not doing any damage to health at all.

Any attack can also be paired with affecting a status condition on the target. This can be something like having an attack that also applies some damage over time with Poison, or could be something like SinisterPlan which makes the target draw an extra card whenever it takes damage.

Status effects are also a whole big system of their own, but they’re essentially the same as card effects which happen whenever a certain condition is triggered. Once they are triggered, they can apply their corresponding effect to the target. These effects can really be anything that the cards can do, such as doing attacks, gaining energy, drawing cards, the options are limitless.

[rijallaw]

Green Card Through Spouse: Preparing For The Interview

Have you been hoping to acquire a green card through your spouse? Do you want to be as prepared as possible throughout the process? That’s what we can do here at the Rijal Law Firm. We can, quite literally, be by your side every step of the way. One part that you may have to deal with: the interview. Specifically, you’ll be interviewed by someone who works for the USCIS.

Your case will be different from any others. So, what we’ve written below may not be exactly right for you. If you have any questions, we encourage you to reach out to us.

Why Is There An Interview? There are actually multiple reasons for the interview. The interview itself isn’t just the USCIS asking you questions. It also involves a thorough examination of forms, identification documents, security-related queries, and a deep dive into the intricacies of the marital relationship. The primary objective is to ascertain the authenticity of the marriage, aiming to root out instances of immigration fraud where individuals engage in sham marriages solely to obtain a green card.

What Documentation Should I Prepare? To bolster their spousal green card petition, individuals are advised to compile and present documentary evidence. This may include joint bank account statements, credit card statements, a shared lease agreement, a visual narrative through pictures spanning the relationship, and testimonials from friends or family. Although no single piece of evidence is obligatory, a comprehensive collection can fortify the case by demonstrating financial interdependence and the genuine nature of the relationship.Remember, in this context, the burden of proof lies on you. You have to demonstrate the bona fide nature of their union.  We can help you to be as prepared as possible so that you’re as ready as you can be.

What Questions Will I Be Asked? While there isn’t a standardized set of questions, applicants can anticipate an exploration of their relationship history. The immigration officer will try to establish the timeline of when you two first met, when the relationship gained seriousness, moments of meeting each other’s families, the decision to get married, etc.

Some officers may delve into more specific details, probing birth dates, names of family members, and other particulars to uncover any signs of green card fraud. We can coach you so that none of this will be a surprise.

How Can An Attorney From The Rijal Law Firm Help? While we cannot respond to questions about the relationship on your behalf, we can navigate legal queries that may arise. Moreover, we can present the immigration officer with meticulously gathered supporting documentation, showcasing its relevance in establishing the authenticity of your marriage. Before the interview even, we’ll collaborate with you so you’ll be able to anticipate potential questions and assemble a comprehensive packet of documentation for the green card through spouse process, being fully prepared.

Will I Get A Green Card Through Spouse After A Successful Interview? Following the marriage green card interview, some immigration officers may render an immediate decision. However, most likely, they’ll review the case and issue a written decision within a few weeks. In the event of approval, the marriage-based green card is dispatched shortly thereafter.

Rijal Law Firm: Ready To Help Today With the assistance of an attorney, applicants can navigate this process with confidence, ensuring that their documentation and responses align seamlessly with the immigration officer’s scrutiny. Successfully clearing this hurdle paves the way for the issuance of the coveted marriage-based green card, marking the culmination of the adjustment of status journey.

To schedule a free case evaluation with us, message us through our site or call.