blueberry-lemon - Tumblr blog

[blueberry-lemon]

4 days into my hiatus from Twitter/Tumblr. Logging back in once a week to check notifs. Timeline already feels like getting hit with a firehose lmao. As usual feel free to follow me on Cohost or check out my personal blog. One step closer to being put down humanely and sent to a nice farm upstate, a farm called Neocities/Nekoweb.

Where to find me from now on!

It's silly to make it an announcement like this, but I'm gonna try to step away from both Twitter and Tumblr.

Current plan is to maybe log back in once a week to check my notifs.

You can find me on all the other places. kylelab on Discord, feel free to reach out and chat about anything.

I hate doing this because I really wanna keep up with the cool people on here that I've interacted and talked with. But we'll figure it out. I'm most active now on my personal blog, which is also a hub for everywhere else you can find me.

Please don't hesitate to reach out to me everywhere else and chat or drop me a line or a silly meme or anything at all! I'm shy and lonely! But I get distracted and frustrated with this place enough that I'm gonna try being shy and lonely somewhere else.

Hopefully you come with me!

*dramatically flips the light switch off while I'm leaving the room, like it's the series finale of me existing*

[blueberry-lemon]

Where to find me from now on!

It's silly to make it an announcement like this, but I'm gonna try to step away from both Twitter and Tumblr.

Current plan is to maybe log back in once a week to check my notifs.

You can find me on all the other places. kylelab on Discord, feel free to reach out and chat about anything.

I hate doing this because I really wanna keep up with the cool people on here that I've interacted and talked with. But we'll figure it out. I'm most active now on my personal blog, which is also a hub for everywhere else you can find me.

Please don't hesitate to reach out to me everywhere else and chat or drop me a line or a silly meme or anything at all! I'm shy and lonely! But I get distracted and frustrated with this place enough that I'm gonna try being shy and lonely somewhere else.

Hopefully you come with me!

*dramatically flips the light switch off while I'm leaving the room, like it's the series finale of me existing*

[blueberry-lemon]

My trajectory of internet usage over time, if all goes perfectly well.

[blueberry-lemon]

i'm in my Assemblage Era

[blueberry-lemon]

TOMORROW 5PM EST help me chip away at my backlog with some LIVE GUNPLA BUILDING ON TWITCH! What kit do we want to build together Winnie Nation?

[blueberry-lemon]

I know it's a losing battle to even post this but I still find it weird and sad that Steven Universe became thought of as "cringe" or "embarrassing" to admit that you enjoy.

I don't even follow fandom discourse, it just somehow finds me sometimes.

[blueberry-lemon]

hoffman's car

[blueberry-lemon]

Two-Dimensional Writing

I think there’s a place for characters, and stories, that are two-dimensional. In fact, I’m willing to die on the hill that sometimes it’s just more fun (and “better writing”) to aim for two-dimensional characters if it fits what you’re going for.

Before writing this, I was curious if there was an actual agreed-upon definition of a “two-dimensional character.” When used casually I feel like we all generally understand what we’re talking about, but I figured before I ran my mouth I should at least check if there was a textbook definition.

Most of the results I got on Google were Reddit and Quora threads of people debating the definition, along with a couple of other like-minded bloggers trying to explain it. So I guess the term isn’t exactly scientific.

So I guess I should try to define it. I guess I would say something like this:

One-dimensional character: Only exists in the world or story to serve a single purpose

Two-dimensional character: A character lacking realistic depth. Lacks complex thoughts, feelings, history, and may not behave like a “real person” would.

Three-dimensional character: A character whose thoughts, feelings, and history feel believable and “realistic”

I think most times that people refer to a story as having one-dimensional or two-dimensional characters, it’s meant as a dunk. But I don’t think it has to be a dunk!

Two-dimensions lets you play in the world of archetypes and expectations. When I think of two-dimensional writing, I think of games like Fire Emblem and Chrono Trigger, where you totally “get” a character’s vibe as soon as they join the party. I think of shows like K-On and One Piece, where you’re invited into the running gags by quickly understanding what a character would do in any scenario.

I don’t think playing in this space needs to be thought as synonymous with “bad” or “lazy” writing. If I’m being honest, I’m pretty sure it’s usually an intentional choice. It’s fun to play in a well-established genre, or toss around some well-worn character tropes, as long as you’re doing it well. Sometimes you’re dealing with a story or game that has a huge amount of characters, and it’s important to write them in such a way that people can recognize them, learn their personality and backstory, and remember them as soon as possible.

On the audience side, sometimes it’s fun and convenient to start something and immediately jump up like “oh, THAT’S gonna be my favorite character!” and then see if your prediction pans out. It can be fun to have a favorite type, or an archetype you like to see, and find out how a new writer puts their own personal twist on it. Or sometimes the depth and the fun of the story is how they take the toolbox of two-dimensional characters you know by heart and arrange them in different combinations with each other. Or place them in unexpected scenarios, where we can finally see how Character B, Character E, and Character H are all going to interact and get themselves out of a challenging situation.

And lastly…sometimes I think a work isn’t quite built for having three-dimensional characters. Either it doesn’t actually have the proper amount of time to explore a person’s full depth, or it clashes with the tone of what it’s doing. It can also, if you’re not careful, make your realistic-seeming characters all become a bit bland and unmemorable, because they don’t have any notable trait to latch onto. Maybe your intention was “this is gonna be a fully three-dimensional, believable person” but all you ended up with in execution was “this is a boring, relatable, average Joe.”

(Obviously, if you CAN pull off a realistically believable cast of characters and have the time to flesh them out…more power to you, I love that too.)

I think it’s also important to remember that the genre-archetype, two-dimensional style writing is not exclusive to any particular genre, mood, or emotion. Heart wrenching dramas can play in tropey two-dimensional spaces, just like comedies can. And maybe the secret sauce to your two-dimensional writing is how you set something up to have one tone and then hop to another tone for a moment of surprise.

So honestly, give me the two-dimensional archetypes. Give me the RPG characters who have like 2 notable traits and 3 emotional states. As long as you execute it well, add in a few surprises, don’t make real-life stereotypes, and have fun with it…I don’t think there’s anything wrong with playing in that space. It works for a reason!

[blueberry-lemon]

LIVE NOW! Coloring comms! Talking about the GWH game! I got sick last week and I have stories (mostly about some bullshit I watched) COME HANG OUT!

[blueberry-lemon]

Frieren: How could you possibly have known the first spell I ever cast for Himmel?

Nardwuar: You're the legendary elven mage from the party of heroes that defeated the demon king, we HAVE to know!

[blueberry-lemon]

Microsoft Oceans (1995) Marine Life

[blueberry-lemon]

I’m sorry Pathfinder:Kingmaker, but I’ve seen a documentary in Netflix about this and I don’t think you are right

[blueberry-lemon]

Kids Looking Out For Other Kids

I wonder sometimes if we should try to create more (safe) situations where kids are spending time with younger kids.

Kids who have younger siblings kind of get this experience automatically. But not everyone has a younger sibling.

I think when a kid spends time with someone who’s, like, three or four years younger than them…they’re forced to recognize that sometimes they have to be the “adult in the room.” And that they have to be a caretaker, and be “the bigger person”, and be sympathetic to the needs of someone else.

I mean, I’m sure there’s all sorts of psychological benefits to spending time with people who are a variety of ages. But in this case specifically, I guess I mean that it’s easy to stay in your own head and only focus on your own wants and needs. Adults essentially are there to help you or structure your life with rules, even if you don’t fully understand their reasoning.

If a kid spends time with a younger kid…they might find themselves making rules like “hey, don’t run up the slide!” or “hey, don’t stick your fingers in that electric socket!” or “hey, don’t put that sharp stick in your mouth!” Now, maybe by epiphany, they’ll realize why adults make rules all the time. They do it to try to protect and help someone who can’t come to the same conclusions on their own.

In other words: by putting the older kid in a scenario where they have to help and communicate with someone who has less experience, less dexterity, less strength, less knowledge, less grasp on language than they do……it teaches the kid that in life, sometimes they will need to help others instead of being helped themselves.

To extend this idea to adults…

…maybe it’s beneficial for everyone to have a chance being a teacher, or a tutor, or a babysitter. Or maybe it’s beneficial for everyone who has a career to have a moment where they need to selflessly help someone who’s aspiring to that same career. An opportunity to put your own self-centered wants and needs out of your mind and figure out the right thing to say that will help someone who’s earlier in their journey.

I feel like when I’m surrounded by only people who are my “peers” or ahead of me, it narrows my empathy and my way of thinking. But by lending a hand to someone who needs help, and trying to carefully pick my words to figure out exactly what I should say to help them, it encourages me to be more patient and more empathetic.

But anyway…I don’t have any kids, so what do I know, hahaha.

[blueberry-lemon]

[blueberry-lemon]

me playing 5x5 Picross for the first time: yoooo this is fun, i can see what all the Picross hype is about

me playing 10x10 Picross for the first time: im in hell

[blueberry-lemon]

Overheard at the dentist, one of the receptionists showing her jewelry to another: I've got a lotta rings. Too many rings. I'm like Sonic the Hedgehog.