#? idk if its long enough for a read more but just in case i'll do that tag lol

[unproduciblesmackdown]

i think i've only seen a soma playthrough twice and the first time i didn't absorb it great lol but upon just some light brushing up (incl a short article that was one of the few results that cropped up when i was like "show me the images for 'soma's save feature featured fisting, right' (yeah basically)") it's like, it's always fun when you're just left with a lot of room to Interpret Themes and unsurprisingly at this juncture i'm lasering in on just, like, the matter of [the self vs the other] via this premise that basically people can just make a copy of their Psyche at any point (but needing to find a new & different Soma in which to upload it but like, largely setting that aside when In This Scenario the new bodies don't affect their minds / sense of self at all....except for when they sometimes do? or maybe not. the like glitchy monsters are just kind of WAU automatons, right. and the people are all able to act / communicate themselves as people, though they might be affected by like, existential crises over the goings on) wherein like....the protagonist can Split In Two* at a few points via the psyche copying/uploading, and then the game Follows the copy that will be continuing to advance the plot, and the version of the protagonist we Were following is now An Other even though it's like, that was The Self (at least insofar as that was our first person pov player character) up till just now. and the protagonist can Know like, yeah that's You right over there also. and yet iirc from like, yesterday's light research, in the first instance he at least gets the Option to kill that Other/Self who was, up till just then, the Self to us too, if that makes him feel better abt the existential crisis, or at least discomfort, enough to like, keep moving right along lol (speaking of. just the other day i was like "adagioly onomatopoeiaing the opening banjo strums of rainbow connection from the muppet movie soundtrack does so much for me" and then i learned it was the anniversary of its theatrical release. hell yes. also memorably once when like marinating for hours in a general malaise & failing to find the wherewital to get up i was like "haha oh wait. i'm playing the song 'movin right along' from the muppet movie in my head. okay" up & at em)

anyways the fisting article (which, i was wondering what thoughts it would have on that truly interesting facet of the game. mostly it posited that the uhh sphincteresque penetration of it all would be Typically considered to make cishet men anxious / threatened / vulnerable, and notes the protagonist (hypothetically a cishet man) is indeed trepidatious about it, while also arguing he markedly Doesn't really hesitate in shit that hurts or endangers others in the course of his shit (though ig that can also depend on the player? haven't really rewatched it recently enough to know how much his dialogue adds to [as a character though he's making it clearer he just wants to cut a swath through your shit asap]) and also questions whether the game thinks of (or, from their argument, knows of) the protag as pretty sphincteresque himself. and like yeah probably imo lol like thee ending being what it is, and as far as i know no like Multiple Endings like in amnesia series* stories usually, and thus more room to have a protagonist who talks to characters in the present and i think like, without the ability to choose what he says

anyways that the protagonist can Understand like, hey see that guy over there, that's literally also you rn, and yet he can [Not accept that] in one case such that he'll kill that Self for "his own" Self's comfort really, as the fisting article expressed, to continue believing he is Unique and the One True Self, the only Real [himself]. when, to be sure, the game Could have kept the first person pov on that version of him we'd Been up till then, and had that pov of the one killed. or maybe left behind in another instance, i don't remember all the "transfers"....catherine Explicitly explaining that only the copy/upload format is possible, Not Transfers, making sense what with like. her magic brain scans that can can wholly parse & store your Psyche data, whatever that'd be like, definitely not being meant to, say, Extract the person's Psyche from their living human body upon doing so. while the ending's drama comes from the game Now staying with the version of the protag who'd been our first person pov character prior to that "transfer," who is Again like "why am i still here" despite having the "it's not actually a transfer" explained, b/c This version Just So Happens to be the copy of the copy of the copy like simon(4) or (5) or whatever and ofc can't have been the one(s) already just left behind somewhere back there in the complex or he wouldn't have been able to be at that point in the first place. and then "killing" catherine b/c he's so pissed, i remember it as him hitting whatever device was her effective Soma, but the article i think suggested she just got too stressed in turn and that Output fried the device. while, of course, post credits shows us their "transferred" selves just fine chilling in the ark like whew glad all that's done with

anyways just getting around to the fact of how it's easy to land on catherine as the center of the game....and of course she's the one really Not having crises over [my god, copies of my Self] or others' selves or what all, having even less of a usual Soma than simon but rolling with it, and evidently having already fully absorbed her Self as a distinct version from her original Self, despite having the same links to her that make simon or anyone else who's been copied into whatever other Soma feel like he's continuously been Himself(tm), the one true Real Self he's always been....and like, naturally catherine being the one behind the entire project of [what if we copy/paste people's psyches into a big ol mmorpg server & shoot it into space so that Maybe something can happen with them / in a way they can continue to exist] so she's Been thinking of, you know, being separate from these Selves turned Others who you'll jettison into space beyond even the body of the earth. unless it's supposed to stay in orbit lol i do not remember the details....and ofc like plenty of other people are like wow that's Fucked Up or it's Not Us and like, the latter sure is true with with the [copying, not transferring] element, but also the former is more choose your own adventure (interpretation) when the game isn't about like, and the simulation Is fucked up, or there's any element of distress or dissonance to existing on the ark, though you can't really know that until the post credits scene confirms you're just hanging out for real....which, that article was also going in on the character who's on this quest to kill the WAU as like "the versions of us it makes isn't Real it's Corrupting" and like, arguably the WAU as just kind of, naturally, something capable of growing, and doing so, and the real problem seeming to come in with the [doing whatever for supposed safety but superceding/supplanting/displacing autonomy in doing so] like, people who did not agree to whatever was done re: their Somas or they would've remembered & been like yeah i'm hanging out as a robot now, or a goop guy, gunk [YES], etc. but separate from that obvious issue it's like, my guy, You're a copy made by the WAU now lol, you're your whole person that you are, with the thoughts & feelings to decide you wanna go on a quest to destroy it, and whatever capacity to pursue it....either way i think the game makes it clear enough the WAU is a Neutral force exercising no conscious discernment, it Is a body, or it's some body (once told me) anyways lol, though i guess i did just go "those Monsters that can chase you are just wau manifestations right" so that's getting kind of complex lol, but even that can be taken as, like, it Mimicking human's shapes & bipedality & other external characteristics, i guess, and just the way an overall theme can be [hmm where's that division between the soma and psyche, machine and ghost] the WAU has been expanding and making various forms of itself, and of humans, and that's also an element of the fisting that starts out as a fingering and can end with having to leave part of yourself in WAU's core if you have completed the choice to corrupt & destroy it, that Connection and Interfacing is required, with increasing [get it in there] required as well though there's no given clear in universe reason why (w/my theory here being: just the Themes of the increasing interaction / reducing Boundary)

where was i going with this. idk naturally there's people like "well you don't have to see the wau as evil or at least required to be destroyed" like yeah one can imagine the case for that, wherein again this one guy's hypothetically mad abt like oh it can't be Us it's making, like, brother in christ You are here as You are b/c of what wau did, if you don't think You're legitimate enough, how can you be dead set on pursuing any decision you make. but also the lack of autonomy wherein wau has (probably? again would have to rewatch) killed people to transfer them to a less fragile soma, but a) also maybe it's just acted when people were already dying / killed from other causes, and naturally there's the Everyone There Doomed To Die Fairly Imminently factor and b) that [wau's neutral / purely soma no psyche (or is it. etc)] aspect that is that classic mixup of wau just acting on its programming in a way unintended by its programmers re protecting life and c) i think WAU can sure be interpreted as a parallel counterpart to the ark project, where people agreed to the latter, & get to chill with simulated bodies in a simulated world, versus the WAU being that [body, world, realm of physical existence] which is funky & Not like a cool nice recreation of the usual world & is also at the bottom of the ocean, but it's sure trying to extend the existence of ppl's psyches by shoving them into whatever robots or slapping together parts or propping up their original body or what all, i don't remember that many of the characters encountered

Anyways Back To Catherine For Real. i'd forgotten this element completely, but that when catherine finds out her original self had been killed by crewmates (lol. amongst) for being set on carrying out the plan for the ark, Her Project, (i.e. launching it into space (risking that launch going incorrectly) vs keeping it on site at the bottom of the ocean here (theoretically less risky, according to at least the crewmate who killed her about her insisting on launching it anyways)) and catherine's copy / now alternate self comments on being like, a bit disappointed And surprised b/c like she says "i knew they didn't like me, but," like not thinking that dislike would lead to a semi accidental killing her (where apparently the guy who killed her may have been wearing the like powered diving suit w/the extra Strength to operate in the water pressure, like oh didn't mean to hit her That hard. in a different soma already) and seeing other ppl (not in universe) commenting on how it sure did seem to be culmination of like "the way others treated her" and how catherine always mentioned like, never having really had friends including as a crewmate here, being an Introvert....in fact, now i'm remembering that catherine doesn't even say "i knew they didn't like me, but" but rather something very close to "i know i'm not easy to like, but" like, aaaugh....like, as ever, a character or a Real Life Person sharing any particular info like "i'm [xyz]" Isn't Required for just trying to always not be ableist and to always treat other people as people even if they don't "just be normal" correctly enough, supposedly. rather than [what is "just being normal" is Correct & Good and you do Not need to undergo a continuous lifelong journey of in fact questioning this & navigating & learning how to communicate & interact & relate, you just need to fleetingly muster some superficial unhelpful Bonus efforts sometimes when you encounter the rare "exception" like someone who hands you their License To Autiste and you can let them keep their fidget cube and continue treating everyone you encounter ever organic aba style]....like, naturally in the game there's no twist where catherine turns out to be Evil or even antagonistic. she's like, patient, encouraging, friendly, helpful all throughout. she's also, ofc, simon's only guide (adding to the suspense of that [my god. my only guide was evil, and/or just my antagonist now anyways]) so he doesn't really get to pick someone he'd Like more. but that like, lifelong matter of why catherine doesn't Get to have had friends. that even as this professional associate she's treated differently, and worse, b/c you have to personally like someone & find them charming & je ne sais quoissy to Not be worse to them? it's fine to be shitty until catherine can, say, say "i've noticed you're being kind of shitty. it's probably b/c i'm autistic, officially, which i'm choosing to share with you & am now presenting my license about it, so maybe be cool about it" and then and only then go "oh ok" and Make The Exception rather than shifting your entire shitty Rule (they also would not actually really make the exception. "shoutout" too to the concept that, of course, it's actually Disrespectful to stop hating autistic ppl b/c you should treat them The Same as anyone else, and you're bringing that organic ABA all the time as part of your "just be normal" ethos life, so be sure to keep being an asshole to them & double empathy probleming putting all the depletion, extraction, punishment, losses, harms on them and all the rewards on yourself)

and like, catherine being killed b/c she was this Body who was going to take away the ark (her project / creation, which she was also just insisting on following what'd always been the plan for) wherein like, even if this guy didn't mean to kill her, he sure did after lashing out at her, same as happens w/simon in the end....and catherine also failing to be thee most "normal/default" version of a person as well by being a Woman, and probably not white either, and, of course, a nonwhite woman, also making her that much more vulnerable to being Out Of Line(tm) by just like, existing as a person & trying to do her shit, though misogyny, racism, orientalism or the like isn't explicitly invoked or especially implicitly hinted at that hard either, but it's like, how does this [scifi magical realism set in the not That distant future but material made in the way less distant past, i.e. all intents & purposes modern / current day of: in the 2010s] have Relevance beyond "would that be fucked up or what" type Invention that doesn't map on to our experiences at all....you don't Have to read into catherine twice being killed by a man who's lashing out b/c she's not delivering what he wants, but you sure don't Have to Not and be like "this is definitely No Misogyny world" like they're still being implicitly ableist b/c she's just not deemed Winsomely Likable enough, she's internalized that with that "i'm not easy to like" framing, why assume a premise of [misogyny is over] [racism is over] etc. whilest soma doesn't really proffer any scenario of like "oh if it weren't for our being able to perceive our designated Physical Differences in our human bodies, all that oppression would be over," that's not being explored even in the specific situation of its plot in the first place; people on the ark seem to have the simulation of the same bodies they originally did, ppl Can retain like, how they'd move, their voices, their sense of their bodies: elements of their physicality. and, you know, whether one even supposes there Is any meaningful body/mind division, though in soma it Is this premise like oh yeah we can digitize your psyche perfectly okay, such that your copy would experience no disruption in that Sense Of Selfness, which is what makes everything particularly like, whoah, and [wow this is just like soma] whenever something kind of invokes similar enough What Ifs but probably less engagingly lol....while also soma is flexible and spacious in letting you interpret shit, you Can defer from fisting wau to death, you don't have to be like "it's so true. thee horrors" abt the Copies Of Selves, who really just become Others to whatever now-other versions of that person, i.e. how catherine, who, as the person who wanted to scan copies of ppl's psyches & put them in a just chilling simulation server launched into space for the Chance of being copy/pasted elsewhere eventually and the chance for the participants to Exist in some form Now, and who did so, is never like, shocked or freaked out by the notion / reality of these copies' existence even though she didn't set out figuring any scans' uploads would end up on the ocean floor stations, she's not aghast & distressed in the end when after having uploaded her latest Self data to the ark & launched it, she's also Not on the ark and Still in the eventually / doomed ocean floor station, even if it's a bummer, b/c she has already just accepted That's How It Works....this [her] was not going to experience being Transferred, like she's Been saying, like she again tells simon while he's blowing up abt [why wasn't i transferred]....just clearly being an example of like, not everyone is like horrified and freaked out and like "that's fake &/or wrong" and you don't have to decide she's incorrect for being Like That, i.e. like, yep, this is the situation, i know there's the me who was killed and the me on the ark and the me here, and i know also we're also for intents and purposes separate people

all that is to say, like, yeah the Scifi What If specific [you can copy/paste your consciousness into a different soma] is there, but also you can be looking at it as just this like, pushing to thee limit of the Self(tm) and the Other(tm) insofar as imagining yourself, as the only Internality / Mind / Selfhood you have access to, as The One True Real Self and all Others as mere somas/bodies, whether you take that to as dehumanizing an extreme as you can or you just put some double standards on Others / treat them as lesser/less Real, or oh but just Sometimes, in Some Cases, which is fine and relevant to anything, rather than what's fine and relevant being to always be aware that everyone's Otherness is a matter of perspective, you're the Other to everyone else, everyone is just as The Self as everyone else, You Could Be That Other, that other Is [you] to themself, you are the "that could be you" to them....with soma, it can just be elevated to "that Other WAS you from 0.5 mmsec ago, and continues to be them, b/c they didn't experience any disruption in their existence, though now you're both in different situations of: different locations, different bodies, the awareness there's that Other Self over there now, possibly the difference of killing that self you were just copied from so you can go on feeling like the One Real Self"....but wherein like, that's just like, [What If: you Were able to wholly & accurately Know the self inside an Other? b/c it's you from 5 min ago] of like, scenarios like [what if you time traveled 5 min into the past] except wherein that case there's usually the efforts to Resolve(tm) the timeline of that One True Self one way or another, ultimately. or is there. obviously who's positing that soma is the only material to be About the "whoa lol. me as an other" concept made scifily literal or anything

anyways that like, it creates that situation wherein one Can point & go "literally literally me" but also simultaneously one Can go "that's Not literally me arrrgh" or "that's also Not literally me, matter of factly"....simon's wrangling with the Othering of his One True Self, but he can also Know, should he choose to shift to that perspective, that all the Others who aren't alternate copies of him are all Another True Selves, An Other True Self even, though ofc as per the nature of not having a collective consciousness, he Doesn't Know the accurate whole of their psyches b/c he was not ever [literally them], but he doesn't need to to know they're just as [a whole psyche in there] as his own have been. original catherine with her fellow original crewmates being othered enough by them for the dehumanization of treating her worse, her being isolated, that indeed her being killed doesn't feel separate from all that by her or by anyone else, just an escalated extreme final fatal manifestation of it, b/c nobody ever liked her in the first place and then she became a (psyche Piloting a) body getting in the way of what one guy with amplified strength at that moment wanted from the project she made to let others' psyches keep existing in some way, which was deemed valuable enough by that guy to want to commandeer it and keep it at the bottom of the ocean versus risk a launch, regardless of how you the player think of the idea

and thinking of the way you can like, effectively befriend that boxy underwater little propellered Regular Simple Robot Helper that follows you around at some point, that is, of course it can't talk to you, it's definitely Just(tm) this not-ever-a-version of a human robot for practical tasks (dyspeptical tasks, clerical tasks, hysterical tasks) and like, imagine Its interiority, get invested, try to protect it, humanize it regardless....whereas with actual humans, and their psyches in a microchip, you can kill them for not perfectly delivering whatever you wanted even when that's not what other humans ever exist to do. then simon loses the Company he still could've Gotten From catherine, [guy who killed original catherine] didn't succeed in keeping the ark unlaunched, b/c that's what you go and do....but really just thinking of that Thread that feels so extremely relevant of like, catherine copy being simon's only option sure and working With him on this mission until we stay with the edition of him who realizes it didn't lead to his escape onto the ark, i.e. always being in relation to him in a manner of a direct practical teamup & a [take it or leave it] sole option for that anyways....but that in her original, human-bodied life, she was always "oh only a little bit" dehumanized by everyone such that she is very much aware of the way that's defined & limited her life, never had friends, i know i'm difficult to like; until that dehumanization escalated to the extreme of trying to hit her to stop her from seeing her project through, and just happening to kill her, and the fact that this seems to no one just a coincidental whoopsie of a fate just entirely disconnected from the way others always saw her and treated her as this Other among others, while other [psyche/soma]s of others who are clearly not Your Self get to have friends and not be isolated and feel hard to like forever and end up killed by coworkers

tl;dr like love a text just inviting plenty of interpretations and lenses and perspectives, ofc gonna look at it like whoa it's anarchy in there (political cats sense) where are the borders where you are thee self above thee other....soma providing that thinnest boundary of like, yeah that mf over there? there but for the [being in a different body, in a different place, with 7 seconds of negligibly different life experience] go ye. but also the usual boundary of "that person is in a different body in a different place with a different whole life but you're [that] to them and they're just as much a person and a self and an other as you are" like catherine center of the game to me

(* just remembered i had these asterisks: sure enjoying how the premise of amnesia games effectively creates Alternate Selves b/w the protagonist's present self, with however much missing time, and past selves whose goings on are completely relevant to the in media res situation you're also tackling while obtaining pieces of that past to priovide further context/info, and how this premise manifests for different stories each time; you've even got oswald like physically divided into Two Selves in a:amfp, though iirc it's not like, psychically equivalent, kinda "regular oswald & nefarious destroy the world duplicitous oswald" lmao, classic....uhh and shoutout to penumbra being similar ish in that the protagonist's story isn't want's relevant, he's trying to find out what happened to his dad and more broadly the like underground pocket world he enters for those answers? iirc....but that soma shares that amnemonic premise of [intro] [suddenly like ???] [having to navigate your present mission & figure out the past & your Missing time] but like, thee respective Lores don't overlap really, soma obviously starts present day and takes an even more obvious leap into a future / completely different location, rather than amnesia games being set in the past with missing time of like, idk months? to even just days, uhh supposedly like [forever] in justine but that's like, i dunno sure lol, the peak mysterious / withheld protagonist really, on purpose. while naturally there's also the fact that, technically, this simon we are following at the start of the game did not actually forget anything, and that's a fun distinction despite that it otherwise initially seems like the same [amnesia] premise....and that he did kind of ""forget"" things in that original simon lived however much longer before dying, that his scan then ofc didn't retroactively include. so once again it's like, well, in amnesia ppl have likewise kind of rewound to a Past Self before the missing [crucial context to your in media res misadventure] time, w/daniel (and justine) even doing this On Purpose, though as is the nature of the amnesia series, everyone regains enough of that missing info about their goings on anyways, though you the player are Not in a story of like "wow they did Exactly the same thing again and ended up in the same place anyways" and Do get to kinda choose who they are / indeed end up with some Alternate Self, potentially, despite there being plenty of room wherein like, it's not precisely, granularly laid out Exactly Who They Are at any point anyways. only just now getting extra amnemonic lore that yes daniel got all fucked up on vitae rituals b/c that's just what happens! and people are fairly horny for it! always a possible interpretation that he was high on vitae (okay one proffered pronunciation of "curriculum vitae" (which i was like lord i feel like i've gone "what tf is that" about before but what tf is that. turns out it's what CV stands for as your specifically educational resumé) does say "vitae" would, in that case, rhyme with "nigh." other sources are listing like a million different combinations of a million different ways to pronounce each syllable. also they gotta say it a way in the game but i forget. daniel's VA apparently being some chemistry teacher? just like alchemy. not what the pope said to do, weird science, it's my creation....) anyways! the psyches diverge, the bodies don't, unless they do (oswald....uhh the guy in the bunker. lambert :( ) like catching up with The Self again, encountering extreme examples of Othering and Dehumanizing and [you are just like only a soma to me] with various means and ends of acting thusly to get xyz results

[on-leatheredwings]

i've found your account only a few days ago but ever since then I've been STUCK here rereading your fanfics, especially ones with damian. i wasn't even a dc fan (heard about some stuf, watched some films and cartoons, but that's it) but now im reading comics since im Obsessed and need more batboys in my life (rip my productivity😔)

Anyway, after Sleepover i'm curious what will Bruce (and maybe even Thalia) think of batboys strange behaviour towards reader. He's smart, so he definitely notices it early on, but how he'll react....

I can see him being weirded out (like he was by Jason's anger issues, before his death), but he also can be an enabler, since Robin (literaly any of them) had a hard life, so if those relationships can help him why not pretend that everything is normal? you'll be safer in a Wayne's Manor anyway

All in all, thanks for a new hyperfixation 💞💞

P.s. About games:

1. Boyfriend to death 1&2 - since you're into yanderes you might want to check this game out. I prefer the second game, but the first is also fun. But beware the trigger warnings!!

2. Long live the Queen - more of a raising sim than dating sim but you still can romance some guys and girls.

,3. Hatoful Boyfriend - mostly a comedy, but there is a yandere.

4. The Royal Trap - it's been a long time since i played it, but it used to be one of my favorites so i'll just mention it.

5. Higurashi - once again not really a romance sim, but its an interesting horror mixed with a slice of life

;A; AWWWW THANK YOU IM SO HAPPY YOU LIKE MY STUFF.... THAT MAKES ONE OF US GIJSDOFAFGHFOJDSD

and yes yes get into DC!!! (girl who hasnt even read a full run since like. injustice)

damn now you got me thinking and excited. incoming spiel

i agree entirely about bruce just knowing how Bad things can get, so to make things simpler, he's like "yes, your darling(s) can stay in the manor, boys. 🙄"

mmm yes..... when it comes to bruce noticing the batboys are yandere, i think it's always sinfully delightful to just have him be reluctantly okay with it. 😈 it's also easier narratively ngl but i also like the idea that the batfam is all just corrupted.

bruce's thoughts are that they (his sons) fight for vengeance and justice but this is where they could use some leeway.... we all need our vice... they fight so hard for gotham, they deserve a little treat (getting rid of your human rights)... it's very "Dad who wants his sons to have happiness even if its not healthy" of him. in fics where bruce is a yandere, well, he's the exact same way so he can't judge. although if that's the case, i like the idea of bruce just being like "yes what we do isn't right. let's not talk about it. just don't kill <3"

still wondering what i like more. a yan!bruce who's self aware what he's doing is wrong but he just refuses to think about it. or a yan!bruce that justifies it all because of his paranoia, Tower of Babel style (if you don't know, that's when it's revealed batman has plans to subdue/kill the justice league just in case they go rogue.)

for the batboys depends on their personality... for damian, he's so resolute in things that i prefer when he just believes 100% what he's doing is okay, if not actually righteous. ^_^

hmmm talia.... I'M STILL UNSURE HOW I PREFER THAT AS WELL... i think talia being a you-arent-good-enough-for-my-son mom is a little cliche but also. she kinda would say that. you'd have to prove your worth somehow but idk how tf darling would do that LOL. in the end, i think talia is just relieved/comforted that her son indeed feels desire and wants love and will continue the family legacy (regardless if youre afab/can biologically have children.)

no THANK YOU FOR THE ASK!!! AND THANKS FOR RECS!!!! heheh yeah ive checked out btd and im not averse to the warnings its more like im not that most of into the designs ngl. fox guy seems cute? AND LMAO FUNNY BC IM ON A HIGURASHI REWATCH (never played it tho)

[butch-reidentified]

do you think it’s possible for a lesbian to be somewhat attracted to a trans woman (who passes well) if the only place she sees the tw is online/in videos/in pictures? i’m gender critical and i believe attraction is based on sex, but if somebody strongly resembles the same sex and you’re only seeing them from a physical distance, wouldn’t it make sense for somebody attracted to that sex to be able to find them attractive? (not referring to pursuing a relationship with them)

its almost 4am at the end of a long work week, and I'm still recovering from covid, so I hope this is coherent lmao

ik this will be controversial but I urge people to really mull over this before reacting in anger, though I really do understand the impulse:

honestly, as a (former) neuroscience researcher and someone still deeply passionate about neuroscience who likes to read neuroscience journal articles in her spare time... I think it's fucking complicated and there's a bit of intellectual dishonesty on both sides. the TRA side claims you can (only!) be attracted to someone's internal identity or ~gender feelings~ while the gc side claims that there is NO circumstance in which a person could pass well enough as the opposite sex to be perceived as attractive by someone whose orientation includes that "passing" sex.

and yet, I've had the experience of being at an lgbt bar or club and seeing someone I thought was a cute masc woman initially, only to realize it was an androgynous or slightly effeminate-appearing gay man - and many many lesbians I've told this to have shared similar experiences with me. I know a male transitioner online who is really cool and calls himself a eunuch rather than a woman or anything, and while I don't find him attractive, I have to admit that in the ~100ish photos I've seen of him (incl many candid full body ones taken by other people), I've not been able to "clock" any distinct male characteristics. maybe that would be different in person, but we live on totally different continents so idk.

I've known a TON of trans people irl, likely far more than most people on radblr or anywhere. this is partly because Florida has the second highest # of trans people in the country, and partly bc of where I went to college, and partly because my life is just strange like that. but I'll admit I've known a couple mt"f"-transitioned folks who I truly had no idea were male for quite some time - physically or behaviorally.

the reality is that your brain only knows what it perceives, and if it perceives a male as a female without your knowledge, and your orientation includes females, then it could be possible to feel attraction. however, I'm preeetty damn sure that would not persist beyond learning that person's sex is male, at which point you'd probably suddenly start noticing whatever male traits you were able to overlook initially. but I don't think it makes rational sense to claim that it's never possible to experience "mistaken" attraction for a period of time. there are known cases of historical women who lived as men who were flirted with by straight women who believed them to be male, for instance.

this is one of those situations where the truth (what I've said above) could be twisted and deliberately misinterpreted by the opposing party, which I believe to be why so few, if any, are willing to acknowledge this. but it's a question I've pondered a lot and this is the only logical conclusion I've reached. and it simply is not rational for anyone to act like anything I've said here implies that homosexuals can/should be open to dating/sleeping with the opposite sex. anyone who could come to that conclusion from this response needs a seriously intensive review of reading comprehension.

like I said I'm not fully awake so I'm sure I could have made my points here more clearly and I'm sure I'll get retaliation from people who want to nitpick my wording or whatever, like usual, but o well.

[changbinsboobs]

If you had to use one word to describe each of skz’s dorm mates dynamic living together what would it be? I feel like some of them would be super chaotic and others super chill (Felix and seungmin lol)

Used the 3rd Eye Tarot. I didn't do the one word thing cuz I'm too lazy to get my creative juices going so i just did a short reading on it:)

*For entertainment purposes only!

SKZ Dorm Pair Dynamics

Chan + I.N - Knight of Cups, 10 of Pentacles, 5 of Swords

They keep their interactions at surface level. As long as they do that their co living goes well. Since they have quite different visions on the world and just overall. They don't see eye to eye and never will - as in u will never see the world the same way your grandma will right, cuz both of u are from different generations. U still love her tho:) as long as y'all don't go into too much depth. Same goes for those two.

I think if they spend too much time together and go to deep in their interactions they'll get pretty pissed at each other pretty quickly😅

I'm also seeing some love stuff going on in there so someone might be inviting their love interest over there.

Lee Know + Han - 6 of Wands, 2 of Wands, Ace of Wands

Very active dorm.

Both of them interact a lot with each other and have plans for places they'll go visit, food they'll try, hobbies they'll do together etc.

Changbin + Hyunjin - 4 of Cups, King of Wands, Death

A funny mood overall.

But actual jokes and fun actually just happen on occasion. Not all the time.

This is a bit difficult to decipher to be honest cuz im not picking up on a consistent energy.

Thats why i think they have like phases (?) they go through. So if they have a lighthearted phase they joke and have fun together.

But then they go back to their hermit mood and each one goes into his own world and hivernate for a while and have their own small rebirth, and then when they're done with that they go out of it and have fun and interract again.

I think thats not something they really are conscious if. If you were to ask them i think they would tell you they're constantly together and having a blast. Cuz those hibernation phases they have, tho long, i think for them feel like one afternoon or something like that. So for them it feel like they're constantly having fun together cuz its like the hibernation phase doesn't count, its like sleeping😂

Felix + Seungmin - The Devil, The Tower, 7 of Pentacles

Honestly seeing those cards scared me a bit, i thought this dorm was gonna be the most lighthearted one but it seems like the heaviest most strained one.

I think each one's in their own world and they have little to no interactions. Each of them works in themselves and their own stuff.

Idk if its something between them that has happened, or one of them had a really nasty experience that they are preoccupied with.

I think one's just minding his own buisenss, not engaging whatsoever in the drama of the other.

While the other is sunken deep into his own suffering and filth and despair.

Its giving victim complex tbh.

Im seeing strong mental health issues. And toxic ways of handling himself and the situation. With every step he tales he sinks more and more into it.

And the whole tragedy thing - i don't think it really exist(?) its more like in his head than in reality. And he brought it on himself (thats why the other one doesn't seem to care that much, im getting the vibe of putting his hands in the air cuz he thinks the other one's just a hopeless case and he should learn to deal with it by himself), from lack of boundaries.

I wasn't planing on saying who it is cuz its none of my business but ya'll already know I think it's Felix so I'll clarify that based on this current energy, and the energy I've sensed from felix before i assume its him. I haven't specifically read about that/ confirmed it with the cards. And i don't intend to do it, cuz i just think we shouldn't stick our noses everywhere. I think the cards just give out enough energy/info for us, and i pick on just as much as i should. If something isn't confirmed by itself, i don't like pestering the poor guys and harassing them to tell us.

[tears-grow-gardens]

TW- ed rant

This is my first ever tumblr post. Normally I'm just a wall flower, sitting quietly in the tumblr corner reading other peoples posts and thoughts hoping to feel less alone in my own mind. I'm not even sure what I want to say but for the past 4 years I have struggled with my eating, some days are really bad and other days it's just like an itch, like I know all the rules, fear and guilt that has stained me but I feel stronger not to let it win. 2-3 years ago I was at my worst, I was in my 3rd year of University, I had lost all hope and drive in my life and I let everything crumble through my fingers, I was failing classes, isolating from everyone, loosing sight of my dreams and what mattered to me. I don't know who was holding the wheel to my life but I felt I had lost control with all of it. I didn't know how to change or help myself, I was so tired of always feeling like a failure to myself and everyone around me. I had been dealing with depression and anxiety for so long and serious case of undiagnosed ADHD and all these feeling felt so permanent, like they would never go away, so I turned to something I felt I could control, which was food. There was nothing I hated more in the world than myself, my body, my face, the way that I believed people saw me. I hated every inch of who I was. I thought that if i could control what went in i would get the results I've always wanted and maybe even get to like the way I look. And the results came, it felt so good to be able to get something right, like for the first time in my life I didn't feel like a complete failure. The feeling of hunger gave me power, how I didn't have to say words to people that I was hurting inside because they could see it from the outside. Wake up, look in the mirror, walk, workout, coffee, walk, coffee, porridge, starve, walk, mirror, bed. This was my life but fortunately or unfortunately I was sniffed out like a rat from one of my house mates who confronted me, it felt like I was standing there naked and exposed with all my secrets written on my skin. After that I felt I had to change, I felt watched and analysed with every move I made. My weight goals put into a box, I tried to make amends with my body and mind but from the years to follow the voices never left my head. Sometimes the voices are merely a whisper and other days the voices are so loud it feels like everyone else can hear them too. Now here I am on tumblr 4 years later writing to say I have relapsed, not that I think I ever recovered but more I was idle with temptation to destroy myself and now I'm back, born again to hack my body to pieces. Ive found myself almost everyday purging in the bathroom, even if its been a normal, healthy meal. I just want to crawl out of my skin and shrink into nothing. I don't want to die and I don't want to live like this but i feel years of rage within me of unnoticed pain that I want to scream to the world and let them know. I have dreams and I want them to exist one day as true but I don't know how I'll ever rid myself of these dark paralysing thoughts. I'm so tired of feeling unloved and lonely, in my 22 years of life I have never known what it is or what it feels like when someone choses to love you. Im so convinced by my own hatred for myself that I believe everyone else sees me the way I do. The toxic thing is, is that I want this for myself, I want the hunger in sanctuary of starving, I want to feel small and fragile and i want people to worry, i want them to say "she's lost weight", while they ponder on how hurt I must be to have lost myself this far.

Anyway enough for one day. idk if anyone reads these long word vomit tumblr posts but thank you if you've read this far and welcome to my fkd up mind.

[seongminiz]

that one was self indulgent for sure… but i’ll make some more if any of them inspire u but no pressure i’m just always here to talk about cravity hehe

pervy loser!wonjin who has a crush on u and is always writing u secret admirer notes at uni and buying u drinks and sweets to buy ur love and he thinks ur oblivious but u know.. u just love making him flustered and frustrated :3 maybe he “accidentally” sends u a video of him jacking off or an audio message so u call him up to help him through it<333

husband!woobin… he’s so domestic imo i feel like he’s sex in the kitchen after he’s made u like breakfast or smth, he’d put you up on the counter and eat you out from there, making a huge mess and then bending you over top of it to take you from behind afterwards<333 if he’s feeling a little freakier.. woobin with breeding kink.. lots of creampies.. fucking you full of his cum, going “i know you can take another one, baby” and going again, the overstimulation making u see stars😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫

servicetop(?)!allen cuz i feel like i never talk about him that much UGH he’d be so cute though, begging you to ride his face, i feel like he’d be into spanking your ass while he eats you out but you’re still in control, grinding into his face, neither of u care if he can breathe or not, gushing into his mouth and he would lap it up so obediently… would want you to ride him after, you’d be pretty gone but he’d still take such good care of you despite the fact that he’s also ruined, holding onto your hips and fucking up into you as hard as he can even while cooing about how well u take him<333

- 🧁 anon

perv!wonjin .... i just see him as so much of a loser its insane .

disclaimer i did NAWT proof read any of this ofc but atp its a given

warnings for this part : kinda stalker-ish behavior srry :3 dubcon in some way ? idk i'll say it just in case

teasing him would be way too fun fun , talking to your friends about your 'secret' admirer and how you want to know who it is so bad whenever he's within earshot of your conversations bc he gets so flustered and obvious abt it , especially when he thinks you cant see him :') tho wonjin might be (read: def is) a perv n a loser , hes smart too , n it won't take him long to catch onto the little game you're playing . the cute little notes n 'love' letters he leaves you get gradually more depraved n explicit , detailing all the things he wants to do to you , n especially the ones he wants u to do to him - to the point you can barely brag about them to your friends anymore . the tables r turned , n now he's the one who gets to enjoy seeing you become a blushing mess bc of his notes .

until that too is not enough for wonjin . it's late at night , and he hopes you're already asleep so he can just delete the blurry, shaky video he just sent you of him pathetically whining your name as he touches his bulge over his sweatpants . but of course you leave him no time for regret , immediately recognizing the only person who would dare to send you something like that - you don't know how he got your number , but you don't particularly care abt that .

when a notification of a call coming from you pops up on wonjin's screen he almost has a heart attack . he scrambles to answer , expecting you to scold and berate him for crossing some sort of unspoken rule that had been estabilished between you two .. and you kind of do , though he can't fight the moan bubbling up in his throat the moment he hears your voice , and your intentions are to make him feel anything but bad about it . pathetic and disgusting ? sure , but that's as far as you'll go , talking him through his orgasm and promising - or more like threatening him - he'll have to repay the favor soon .

ANYWAYS !

husband woobin omg 💔💔💔 ik breeding is basically the only thing i talk abt when it comes to him but like ,, come on how can't i do that have u seen him .. just thinking abt husband woobin with an insane stamina who can go for so many rounds and cums so much , until you're reduced to nothing but a cum dump for him ☆_☆

pls i feel so bad abt not writing as much for allen (to be completely fair , my blog is veryyy minhee n seongmin centric 😭😭) but yeah he'd be such a good service top :( treating u so well n eating u out until u have nothing left to give him n then making u ride him :(( n fr at that point more than riding its just him trusting up into you n coaxing out of u all ur weak n soft moans </3

[iraprince]

I adore all your art with cookie and was interested in Sapphicworld- but I’m curious (so plz don’t take this as a negative-) what exactly in your opinion sets it apart from other Queer PBTA hacks like Thirsty Sword Lesbians?

I’d just really like to hear your thoughts about it as a system and world especially given you are a indie developer yourself?

hi!! thank you!!

so, a few caveats before i start off — one, i actually haven't played many other pbta games (like for example i know Of thirsty sword lesbians + own a copy that i've poked around in but im not very familiar w it), so i honestly can't provide much in the way of comparing/contrasting it w other pbta stuff in the same vein, and my impressions of sapphicworld are pretty much just contained to the game as its own thing, not so much sapphicworld as a Type Of Game

and two, while i am a dev myself, i'm a huge novice! like, i'm proud of the stuff i put out and i love doing it, but i personally feel like my lack of experience is such that like, i don't think my opinions in this case are particularly informed by my own work as a dev or anything. all this to say im happy to answer this question, i think i just gotta tackle it from a different frame than what ur specifically asking!

BUT ANYWAY. i can still talk abt why im so excited abt sapphicworld in a way that has kind of outstripped other stuff in general, and for me it's about the world 100%. like i honestly spend close to no time thinking abt the fact that sw is even pbta to be honest. not that the mechanics + gameplay aren't important, bc they are thoughtfully crafted and well done and fun, and i'm saying that from the perspective of someone who playtested earlier versions that have now been reworked! it's just like, not what comes to mind first for me — what's exciting and fresh and irreplaceable abt the game in my mind is like. it is fully committed to immersing you in an extremely lush, strange, richly fleshed out world, one with a long history and folklore/mythology and a TON of really fun npcs who all have different subcultures and its own calendar with seasonal holidays and regional terrain with specific fleshed out dungeons/towns/etc to discover and even like, specific FOODS typical to each different region and and and and —

and maybe at first that seems kind of overwhelming, and tbh it is. when i first got into it and i was going thru the playtest document (which if im remembering right was like. ~300 pages shorter at the time than the current playtest doc) i DO remember anxiously thinking to myself "god this is a LOT and idk if i'll be able to retain enough of this to rp convincingly" etc etc. but like... it's just really compelling, and it does an incredible job of mixing humor and gravity and horniness in a perfect ratio that always comes across as intensely earnest and makes it equally easy to have a fun goofy time or a really emotional time, which i think is REALLY hard to do.

and while normally it's hard for me to get thru something that dense and long all i can really say is that i just straight up like it enough and was charmed by it enough to pick away at it until i grasped it and felt like i understood a bunch about the world, which also has a curve to it bc in structure and tone its very different from any of your... idk more Standard fantasy or sci fi worldbuilding, so it's not like u can immediately slot in ur expectations from other settings and just learn some new vocab words, it's a world that from my perspective also Functions differently than a lot of other fictional settings in a way that's a little hard to describe succinctly. (none of this is succinct to begin with but ykwim). it makes me want to gm my own campaign, really really bad, when usually i have always been absolutely Terrified of the idea of gming! idk man. it has a Flavor. it's full of Vapors. u get transported somewhere else reading it and playing it in a way i haven't experienced in a while and a lot of times after a playtest session i felt like my brain stayed behind in sapphicworld for a pretty long time.

i feel like i am sounding a little melodramatic and incoherent but like. genuinely sapphicworld is just a fictional world that i am really bone-deep charmed by and interested in and when i WAS reading thru the rulebook for those first days it did not take me long at all to find myself constantly thinking "i want to play in this world, i want to play in this world, i can't wait to play in this world," and i just think that's really special. and like — just as your curiosity abt comparing sw to tsl was not intended as a diss or a negative, what im abt to say is similarly neutral — im a person who sometimes finds it a little difficult to click with or feel excited abt a lot of the Queer Indie Stuff that i see get popular with other people, bc it just doesn't connect w my specific lesbian + trans experience; not that it feels inauthentic but that im like, oh, idk, i think these guys are just. not My Zone, ykwim. on the flip side so much of the humor and heart and transness and sex in sapphicworld is something that really resonates w me and just Clicks in a way that i have also found really special.

rounding myself off before i ramble for like five more paragraphs but just as one more morsel of something i like abt sapphicworld that is a little more concrete than me spinning around the room yelling "I JUST LIKE IT OKAY": one of the most fun parts of character creation is getting to mix and match your kind (sort of like ancestry/species, the form ur physical body takes) with a subculture. so u get things like a werewolf babe (cookie! babe being a subculture that focuses on being Like, Totally Hot), or a centaur knight, or a minotaur debaucher, or a vampire cowboy, or an organist (cthulu-y tentacle guy) scenester, or a skeleton wizard, etc etc etc etc — there are SO MANY to pick from that when i was trying to bait my friends into playing w me i couldn't find a convenient way to list them all so ppl could start thinking abt their characters. and every possible combination basically is interesting and amusing and fun and practically THROWS a great oc into your lap and i literally think i could amuse myself endlessly just Making Characters in sapphicworld and never actually playing w them.

[panting, disheveled] so tldr. i like it. uh. what sets sapphicworld apart from other ttrpgs to me is that i have fallen balls to the wall in love with the very soul of it to the point where i don't even really think about it in comparison to other games at all and it has just become an Experience to me and i suppose i cannot guarantee anyone else will fall into insane homosexual hysteria in the same way but here we are. HOPE THAT HELPS

(ALSO PSSST. idk if this is just perfect timing or if ur curiosity was specifically prompted by this but the @sapphicworldttrpg patreon DID just launch and if any of this has been intriguing u should check it out. okay mwah bye)

[llumimoon]

Pssst Cal in a dndads Voltron AU which teen do you think would control each lion? ,':) (yeah Hermie is included here lol there's 5 lions after all!)

BABA YOU DONT EVEN KNOW ... I ALREADY ASSIGNED ALL THE TEENS LIONS BEFORE. I'VE THOUGHT ABT IT TWICE NOW WITH LIKE A MONTHS LONG GAP BETWEEN..... You came to the right place is all I'm saying JWBEVAJHAHAHA

Okay lets get the most obvious one to me out of the way, which is Link in the Yellow Lion. Like. First of all the fact that Yellow is A LEG and also Yellow representing kindness .... I think he really does support the team and grounds them in many aspects. Also Yellow is bulky like a dnd paladin LMAO it just makes the MOST sense to me? Yellow also being the color I associate with Link so maybe that gives me a slight bias lmaooo

The rest are. LESS clear to me. I HAVE already settled on an arrangement I'm more or less okay with but I could make a lot of arguments for alternative placements !! I will also admit maybe the places I settled on are a little color biased?

The Lions DO kind of have traits associated with each one except its. much less clear in some cases than others and I had to be a little flexible bc in my opinion NONE of the teens r like . smart enough for the Green Lion JWBECWUAGAHAA like they're all smart in their own ways and I do bend some rules a little to make their smarts work as an argument but I feel like Green is more book smart than anything which makes it difficult.

Uhmmm everyone else from here on out has at least two lions I could argue for and then I'll say which one I settled on? But like if you disagree thats totally fair LMAO like I said many assignments can be considered

Scary I mainly thought about the Black or Red Lion... There's the whole. Scary's the leader! Thing and also the idea of power corrupting... but also she can be pretty impulsive which is why I considered Red, also her tendency to have fire based magic mishaps LMAO I think Scary shows a lot of growth and inner reflection and also she has good insight on how the others seem to be feeling even if she doesn't always act on it or use it in the right way, so I could see that as the markings for the beginning of a Black Lion learning to be the leader type arc? Also to be honest shes the Main and practically Only contender for Black so she ends up getting it by default.

Hermie I think could be the Blue or Green Lion. I don't actually remember if they say IN THE SHOW what the Blue Lion stands for, but like. I've read so much Lance fanfic LMAO that to me it stands for Flexibility and what is Hermie if not flexible. Maybe too flexible? In the sense of. She will fill any role that is needed or given to her, like water will. I also thought Green bc to me Hermie is a character who is VERY in his head. Like they overthink to the point of looping back around to stupid again but also shes always playing mind games with other people. Hermie seems to always be one step ahead or at least is good at pretending they are. Also you can say the nature stuff is Hermie in his poison ivy era. Green is also pretty small and easy to damage which lines up with how fragile he is in a fight and maybe you could make an argument for the camouflage being like shapeshifting? idk. Anyways I decided on Green I think.

Normal I think I'm biased bc he's my fav and Lance was my old fav and I already made a post before about how I think they're similar and would get along and ANYWAYS LMAO I think its clear I gave him Blue. Something something, the legs being the support of the team something something water meaning flexibility but also ice can be stubbornness something something how I associate Normal (and lowkey the Doodler) with water (a whole nother thing to get into u can ask me to elaborate later) etc. I also played around with the idea of him in Red as Scary's right hand bc . shakes them . I think it could possibly fit but not as well? Fire isn't really Normals thing. I also briefly considered him for Black bc Normal is usually the one pushing the group towards a certain goal, but also his plans kind of never end up going through so I was like hmm not sure about that one. Blue I think is the best fit for him in the end which is why everyone else ended up where they did.

TAYLOR. Ok process of elimination you probably already figured out that I chose Red for him BUT I also considered Blue and Green. Green is fun bc you can play with his roughish abilities, like hiding and sneak attacks. His knowledge is more obscure facts and survival skills but I think it's enough to be a contender! I cannot explain the Blue stuff its all vibes in my head but trust me . I think also leaning into, Blue and Yellow are the legs that support and stabilize the team thing, Taylor is actually pretty good at keeping a cool head all things considered. Red, yes maybe slightly process of elimination but COME ON ITS BIG SWORD AND ALSO FIRE POWERS!!! Taylor would love that shit. Also going zoom zoom fast. Also the Red Lion is the second in command/right hand of the Black Lion and it just fits Taylor's protagonist vibes LMAO I think he usually is off doing is own thing which is also very Red Lion.

So to summarize: Scary Black, Taylor Red, Hermie Green, Link Yellow and Normal Blue.

Again I could totally see the justification for shuffling them around a bit but this is the assignments I settled on? The colors lining up is also nice I will not lie. I also could see an alternate universe where Normal is Red, Hermie Blue and Taylor Green, I think thats my second most favorable arrangement.

LMAO SORRY I DIDNT MEAN TO MAKE THIS SO LONG I'VE JUST THOUGHT A LOT ABOUT IT BEFORE. AS YOU CAN CLEARLY SEE. I take sorting my characters into categories VERY seriously 😤 enrichment for me.

[accirax]

Disventure Camp All Stars Power Ranking (Round 14)

With last episode's elimination weighing heavy upon us, I'm at a bit of a loss as to what will happen next. Still, I have to stick to it, and hope I'll be luckier with this week's upcoming ranking.

In case you haven't seen my previous power rankings, the Power Ranking Format is essentially a way of ranking how well each player is doing in the game. So, in essence, this is a long form way of predicting who I think will be eliminated from the competition in the next episode. There will be spoilers for last week's episode (obviously) and its power ranking, so make sure to read that first if you don't want to be spoiled on how I ranked our last boot. If you want more clarification on the rules, that first post will help you out as well. Furthermore, I'm going to be spoiling the preview for next episode, so if you want to go in TOTALLY blind, save this for later. Let's go!

Recap - Gabby's Elimination

Current Score: 61 acquired/90 total

(Points versus @venus-is-thinking: 12 acquired/17 total)

Oh boy.

Look, I already rambled about how weird it is that Gabby was eliminated in this manner in my initial thoughts, so I won't waste my time writing the whole thing out again. It is true that Gabby already had a pretty complete character arc (going from insecurely relying on Ellie 100% to being afraid of what would happen when she was alone to overcoming her intrusive thoughts), so I can understand why the writers thought it would be okay to get rid of her now. I-- and I think a lot of others-- aren't so much upset with Gabby being eliminated as with the fashion in which it was done. Certainly for these power rankings, throwing in an elimination without voting was not something that I'd accounted for.

Thankfully I did well enough on Yul's elimination that how poorly I did with Gabby kinda got canceled out. Although, it also means that I wasn't able to reap the benefits of getting a 9/9 last week, and am now back in the 70% accuracy zone, though. Sigh. I fear that it won't get any better from here.

Let's just hope that there's an ACTUAL VOTE THIS WEEK HAHAHAHAHAHA (/lh)

Trailer Analysis

Ally pulling herself up into this tree and then Grett seeing a leaf falling from above makes me think that Ally might hide in a tree to spy on people, and Grett might spot her doing it. Embrace that Spy Nest, Ally.

EMILY???? MAYBE?????? Idk, I just miss her so much and I want her to come back.

Idol hunting, maybe? Or trying to spook people into thinking there's an idol to be found?

I assume this is actually Derek trying to check up on Trevor/see if he's okay, he's just doing it in his own Derek way.

It even seems like Trevor and Derek might both be serving as challenge tester interns for this challenge, which would add to the reading that Derek wants to make amends with Trevor.

Friendship! :D Death flag? D:

I hope that this is Jake telling Connor to get his head in the game instead of just yelling at him for no reason. If you're angry at him for being mopey, you're being a bit of a hypocrite, Jake.

Okay yeah, more treevidence.

This is a pretty standard strength-based Survivor challenge. Although, much like the balls challenge, this was also one that was discontinued for injuring the real life contestants too much. It's interesting to note that, for some reason, Connor's light turns red instead of being blue at some point in the challenge. It could just be an indicator that he makes it farther into the challenge (he's shown with eight bags instead of four). However, it could also be some sort of penalty, including one that starts at the beginning of the challenge.

To quote Venus, "IT'S THE BREAK CONNOR'S LEGS CHALLENGE???"

"I'm starting to feel like myself again~!"

This is presumably about Grett returning to her more villainous ways. Ironic, considering that she's just left the villains alliance, or at the very least it's less powerful now than it's ever been. I guess Yul and Gabby were both keeping Grett in check, in their own ways. Still, I missed s1 Grett, so hopefully we can get a bit of that flavor back in this end stretch. Also, this is the only scene we see with sunset lighting. That means that this scene is definitely the last chronological scene to appear in the trailer, and probably from after the challenge is over.

Power Ranking

#1: Grett

Speaking of Grett, let's keep talking about her.

Although I think Grett is in a much less safe position than she was before Yul or Gabby's elimination, I would still be surprised if she was the next to go. Obviously, I said that about Gabby too, but Gabby's elimination also strengthens Grett's position. Would they really eliminate Yul and Gabby AND Grett back to back to back? I sincerely hope not.

There also seems to be a lot of foreshadowing that Grett will be in a position of power/decision making in this episode. Last time, she said that she wouldn't forget that Alec and Riya continued to stand by Yul, and this time, she's clearly getting up to some sort of scheming. Obviously, it's possible for a character's own meddling to wind up taking them out in the end. However, I don't think that's what they'd want to do with Grett right now. She doesn't need to have what power she's finally managed to accrue swept out from underneath her again.

Oh, and she just told Gabby that she'd kick ass in the competition for her. That's not something you say right before getting cancelled yourself. Grett really should be okay.

#2: Jake

And, sure, why don't we put my other best winner candidate in the #2 position as well? If I think these guys could make the finale (together, even), then surely they have to make it past this episode, right?

I am a little bit worried for Jake, as there is definitely potential for Ally to shoot some votes his way. I'm almost expecting him to get some votes this episode, I just don't think it'll be enough to have any effect on him. Given his growing relationships with Aiden and Connor, I don't think that either of them would really ever vote for Jake at this point. That means, that, assuming all three of them vote together, Jake would need literally every single person in the game-- Alec, Riya, Grett, and Ally-- to vote for him in order to have a majority. Like I said, I am a little worried that that could happen, but overall, I don't think it will.

Despite the level of focus Jake has gotten this season, I still feel like there's more to come with him. I think the writers might want to expand more on his relationship with Connor, with both of them feeling like screw-ups, and Aiden and Jake's newly friendly dynamic is super fun to watch. In either case, as is probably evident by the fact that we haven't seen Connor or Aiden on this list yet, I think that Jake is the least narratively expendable of the true heroes. If you removed him, Aiden and Connor don't have much tying them together. Jake is the lynchpin of that alliance from a storytelling standpoint, and I think they'll want to keep him around for that reason.

#3: Connor

Okay, potentially a bold choice, given how many death flags Connor was throwing up at the end of last episode. You can't just spill your entire backstory in a heartfelt conversation, dude, you're gonna die. And now he's in the #3 spot that's been cursed by Gabby?! Now I'm really second guessing myself...

I do think that Connor's clock might not have ticked its final tock yet, though. Despite the fact that I honestly think it's more likely that he's been impaired (probably by Riya) in this challenge than that they spoiled that he makes it to some sort of second round, I still think Connor might win. Sure, in the superhero challenge, he wanted super strength; it's not that he had it already. But, who else is supposed to win this challenge? Twink 1 or 2? The gamer girl, or the depressed bookworm? Riya's snappable-looking arms?

My money's on Grett if not Connor, but I think that Connor winning immunity this episode would be an appropriate level of win for him after the rough time he went through last episode. It would prove to him that he can be strong and have good things happen for him, even if the circumstances are actively stacked against him. Jake's supposed pep talk could also help get him in the proper mood, which could bring the two of them closer together.

It's also still true that I think that Aiden, Jake, and Connor is still the voting block that's most likely to work together in the upcoming vote, making it harder for the villains to get enough numbers to eliminate Connor. I could definitely see Riya and possibly Alec wanting to continue targeting him, and if Ally has become Riya's lackey, she could go along with it too. Grett, I don't really see, but... I can't deny it's a possibility.

Still, I find it unlikely enough that Connor will be immediately eliminated that he's at #3. Ugh, now I totally feel like I've jinxed it, and it will just be that Connor goes home again. C'est la vie, I guess. Use that old man strength to prosper, Connor!

#4: Aiden

Blah blah blah, Jake, Connor, and Aiden working together means that they're all less likely to be eliminated in this episode, you've heard it twice before immediately prior to this. I do think that Aiden is probably the most likely of the trio to be eliminated this episode, though, even if I can't exactly put my finger on why.

Part of it is probably that Aiden was a finalist before, which makes me less likely to think that he will be again. Aiden also already beat Riya via James in s2, so there isn't as much of a need to have him outlive/triumph over her again this time. Also, while we've debatably concluded Connor's character arc with that conversation at the end of last episode, it definitely feels like we're winding down on Aiden's content for the season. He's certainly made it far enough to appease James and Lake at this point, and that fist bump with Jake may be a signal that they are truly and undeniably friends at this point. If that's the case, why is Aiden still here?

To be honest, a big part of why I've put all of the heroes pretty high up this week is because of Grett's quote from the end of the trailer, the one about feeling like herself again. If Grett has started stirring up trouble, how is that supposed to result in Aiden going home? Or Jake or Connor, for that matter. Given that Ally has seemingly flipped over to the villains' side, Grett voting with them to take out a hero is, like, the default. What's so spicy about that? I mean, it's spicy that Ally is now voting with the villains, but that has nothing to do with Grett!

It is definitely possible that I'm overthinking things, and that continuing to work with the villains (but of her own volition instead of Yul's) is making Grett excited to be a bad guy again. If that's the case, I'll surely regret putting all of Jake, Connor, and Aiden in the upper echelons of the list. However, I feel like Grett is planning to scheme something beyond what's more obvious, and that it's more likely that she will turn on Alec and Riya to work with the hero boys instead. If that's true, then all of them really should be safe.

#5: Alec

Welcome back from the brink of death, Alec. Don't make me regret moving you back up.

Alec was taking an unprecedented number of Ls last episode, and I fear they may keep coming for him. But, if that's the case, it may actually make him less likely to go home. No longer having any power, Alec at least appears like much less of a threat. He is still a worry when it comes to physical challenges, but there's much more of an appearance, at least, that he could now be taken out whenever.

I also feel like taking him out right now would be a little random. Like, if you were gonna have him go out as a direct result of the kiss, it probably should have been last episode. The current timeline of events would be Alec kisses Riya, then the truth is revealed and there's a strain on their relationship, then Alec just waffles around for an episode or so before being eliminated. Why have that period of waffling around in? The same felt true of Ally, and then they picked her up for a new plotline and some continued relevance!

Everybody keeps reiterating to me in the comments that there desperately needs to be a true villain in the final three, and they'd never eliminate Alec before that point because they need him there to be a losing finalist. And, you know what? Fair. I don't know as much about how Total Drama works as I do about how Danganronpa works, so if that really is a rule that's written in stone, maybe I should start listening to the wise words of the more informed fans. I'm always a fan of messing with the rules to catch people off guard, and I personally would probably prefer a finale where I'm not already certain that one of the three finalists isn't going to win. (Like, let's be real, ONC knew to cut off the s2 finale part 1 at whether or not Aiden would be saved instead of whether James or Riya would win, because once James jumped off that cliff it was basically a foregone conclusion that he'd be the winner.) However, it's nice to have some villain representation in the finale as well, and maybe that still can be Alec.

#6: Riya

I don't have much specific to say about Riya, just, like... bad vibes.

I could completely see Grett's scheming be in an effort to get Riya out of the game. Currently, I think Riya reads as the biggest dog on campus, so if Grett is looking for her "game defining move" (to whatever extent that actually matters), it could totally make sense to target Riya. Now that Connor is moving towards moving on, all she has to do is say the word to Jake, Connor, and Aiden, and I'm sure they'd comply. The scheming would be to the extent that it's a blindside, and Riya doesn't realize that she lost hold on Grett to an extent that Grett would be looking to target her.

There's also the fact that Riya was a finalist before, and therefore may not be again. I maintain that if they're going to have a repeat finalist, it's more likely to be Riya than Aiden, but there's always the possibility that it's just neither of them and Aiden could be taken out later.

I really don't have much else to add. I think Riya could very easily be in danger this episode, and there isn't much depth to it. Leaving Alec to fend for himself could be an interesting turn of events as well, as he never competed in s1 without Fiore by his side, and his plan going into the season of focusing more on his social game would have totally backfired. I'm not fully convinced on Riya going home, but it seems like a likely enough outcome.

#7: Ally

Oh, how the mighty have fallen. To be clear, I'm talking about Ally's placement in the power rankings-- from first place to last place-- as opposed to the decline of her character. Even if she's choosing to act a bit more villainously, I haven't started to dislike her more, or particularly think that she's being written worse. I merely think that she's put herself in a pretty precarious position.

As I said earlier in this power ranking, I think that Grett is going to be a major player in this episode, and as such I think that those scenes depicting her and Ally in the tree will be Relevant. Basically, I wonder if Grett will stir up trouble by throwing Ally under the bus this episode. It won't be hard for Grett to convince Jake and Co. to take her out, and if she can convince Riya that Ally has been spying on her (while still pretending to be under Riya's wing), Riya and Alec might turn on her, too. The scheming, therefore, can be a plot to humiliate Riya by tricking her into voting out someone who genuinely wanted to work with her. And, with Grett now joining the heroes, Riya and Alec's days are totally numbered. It's a brilliant plan to pin all six votes on one person in a move that secretly swaps your major alliance and gives you lots of power... just like what I predicted Riya would do to Alec last episode. Mannnnn...

Anyways, if you're like me, you might be wondering what an Ally elimination would do in terms of Ally's character arc this episode. It is possible that there would be some issues with Ally's heart simply being broken by an elimination in ways the writers don't want. However, there are a few ways around it. The first is that Ally, already having learned that it's better to play as herself instead of who she thinks the audience will like, will be satisfied by her elimination as a result of her trying to play the game as she thought best. That's like, super unlikely to have happen, but it's not totally impossible.

The other is that Ally will be upset, freaking out over whether flipping to being a villain and then immediately being eliminated as one will have totally ruined her rapport with literally everyone. But, she'll be comforted either in this episode or in the eventual Loser's Motel episode. In the case of being comforted this episode, I could honestly see Grett being the one to do it. In season 1, Grett was eliminated after the villains turned on her, and then faced a lot of public backlash for her actions. It was tough, but she made it through. Ally should be proud of the game she's played, having made it this far, and not take it too harshly that she got outplayed.

The Loser's Motel option would probably include Hunter and/or Tess trying to cheer her up, with the added bonus that Ally could see what people really thought of her this season. If they actually thought that she was more funny/engaging/interesting this season, that could lift her spirits. It could also be a combination of both, where Grett gives her word of confidence now and social media finishes it out later.

The other point of conflict is Ally's relationship with Jake, which... uhhhh, I don't know. If Ally does go out here by Jake's hand, I don't think that their relationship will be at all salvaged. However, I also don't know if that's one of the goals of this season? They might just hate each other, and that's the end. I think the biggest issue with that is, if Jake wins, it might be a bit of a weird look to have your winner have a lot of animosity towards another fairly rootable character.

Should that convince me out of putting Ally down here? I don't know, maybe. But on these trajectories, how would Ally and Jake ever make up, even if they had the entire rest of the season to do it? Both of them being losing finalists? I don't know! So, Ally stays here for now.

Well, that's the power ranking for this week. Unlike either of the past two weeks-- despite how different their outcomes were-- I'm not confident at what I've put here at all. I'd put, like, everyone here other than Grett at like 5 or 6 if I could. Will that lack of confidence be unfounded in a brilliant result, or will I have swung for the fences and missed wildly again? Honestly, as long as there's a genuine vote out this episode, I'll be happy. I look forward to seeing what happens on Saturday.

[tadpolesonalgae]

helloooo, i hope this isnt weird at all.

u really inspired me to start writing one of the wips ive had cooking in my head for 10,000 years with CBMTHY (i love your interpretations of all the characters across everything youve written, even dark! versions of everyone).

but how do you get the thoughts in your head onto the page :( its a little demotivating to not be as good of a writer as I'd like. so im terrified constantly that the story isn't coming off correctly. it certainly doesn't help that I've been stewing on this fanfic concept since i initially read acotar and tog, (crossover shit woo!) but the scenes are so vivid in my imagination that everything i can actually type out seems to fall flat or seems jumbled with the amount i try to include.

like, i posted a part last night after having it ready to go for months (there are several more im hiding 😭) and have reread it 3 times and have to remind myself its fine and i dont need to delete it. but idk if im just being crazy tbh. Im also very much the same type of person who needs feedback in order to continue with creative projects. however the idea of even asking about it here is intimidating, especially after your stories helped push this lil amateur to write. But any help would be so greatly appreciated, especially becsuse theres no one ik personally who enjoys the series who would be willing to chat about it 😅

again, i hope its not weird that im not sending anything in directly related to ur work and asking for advice 😅😅 but i hope you have a good rest of ur day/ night !!

haha, don't worry about it! I'm not sure I'm the best person to offer advice on this since I'm just kind of writing what I want to write though, but I'll try and help.

What you mentioned about struggling to get thoughts down on the page - I think an element of it is probably feeling comfortable enough to put them down there in the first place? That and also having the words to know what you mean? Read around, listen to music, chat with people if you can and see if you can find stuff you resonate with and then pay attention to what it is and try to figure out why. And it can take a while to find the right words, so let yourself breathe.

Suddenly jumping into a project you've been hyping up in your mind won't come out pristine immediately, it might be a case of writing paragraphs once, then writing them out again beneath that but trying to improve on what you've already written with a thesaurus in hand. It might also be a case of listening to music that simulates the emotions you want to write out and then trying to articulate them in the moment. Also writing without thinking can help. Or writing exactly how you're thinking, I guess? It doesn't always work though, so I'd sincerely suggest trying to write some smaller things to start with or have on the side to help practice.

In terms of trying to find people to give feedback, I think interacting with other writers can help. I'm not the best person for this since I like being away from my computer/phone as much as possible, but chatting to writers off anon, or if your writing blog isn't your main one then switching to your writing blog to leave a comment or reblog and leaving notes in the tags is a really great way to show other people you're interested in acotar/tog and writing. If the idea of coming off anon to interact with writers is (like I find it) absolutely terrifying, you can always keep anon on but sign off using a specific pseudonym or emoji that will be recognisable! That way you can get used to chatting without entirely compromising your anonymity and hopefully become comfortable. Asking other people what they do to help them get their thoughts down too can help since you'll be more likely to find someone similar.

I'd also recommend that if your story is long to try planning it out roughly as chapters or bulletpoints so you don't have to store it all in your brain. Have playlists on hand or boards on Pinterest to look over.

I think it's great that you've posted a chapter though - if you have a project you want to do well it's so easy to get caught up in wanting it to be a good as possible that you never actually get around to posting it, so I think what you've done is a great start. If you're unhappy with it after a few months or so you can always edit, nothing's written in stone.

And if you want to write in again please feel free to! I promise it doesn't have to be about my writing and I would think other writers would feel the same. If you want to turn off anon that's fine, and if you want to use an emoji as a sign off that's cool too, you can work your way up to chatting more openly about the stuff you enjoy :)

Also, if anyone else thinks they have some good tips for writing, getting thoughts down, keeping up interest/motivation with a project please add them!

And anon if you want to send in a link to the first part of your story feel free to, or if you want to chat with me directly I'd be interested to have a peek at what you're writing? I love acotar but tog still has a special place in my heart so I'd love to read more content around it too. I know how scary it can be sharing stuff you've worked hard on :)

[odysseys-blood]

then, can you give us a list of games you recommend?

i sure can thank u for asking! i'll try to make it a bit more brief but under my top 4 i'll add a readmore with a longer list in case u wana read that and not the like. Odysseys Blood Introductory Game Pack.

so starting with the top picks:

1. The World Ends With You

i think a lot of people have a similar feeling about this game. you play as neku, recently deceased kid with no memories no friends and a whole lot of attitude and your main goal is to survive the reaper's game for 7 days to get a chance at living again. he trusts no one and believes in nothing but himself and being an extremely depressed middle schooler, i related to him but watching the way he changes over time and learns to open himself up. its kind of an eye-opener and i've seen the same though echoed through a lot of different people like me who wanted to really give up but this game does take you by the hand and oush you to try again. make connections. live and whileit may be a struggle its alright because you always have the option to keep going. also the ost is AMAZING and the art style is very unique and the story and characters captivate you so well. idk where id be without this game honestly. preferably if you do want to play its best to play the og on a ds (can be done w/ a hacked one) but if not its on switch and theres a sequel! which is ok but its not as great as original twewy

2. Tales of the Abyss

ToA (or tota as most ppl tag it but i stick with toa to match the tags for other tales games. which are also good esp vesperia i just wont add it to this list bc its already gonna be a long one). what stood out to me a lot with this game besides the main cast who i love to bits, is its theme on religion actually. when i first played toa i was still in the church and the main theme of religion in toa can be boiled down to devotion is all fine and good, but don't let it rule your life. the fate that is written out for you doesn't rule you, you make your own choices. even if they seem futile, you still don't have to take your fate sitting down you can kick and scream and fight as much as you want towards another path if that truly is what you desire. and that resonated with me heavily. this one's a little more crunchy looking from its age but i still really like the graphics (and i played on 3ds lol) and the environments in tales games are all so stellar its such a good game. and oh my GOD the party interactions. tales games usually do really good at having main casts that are "6-8 people who have no business being stuck together but they are anyways" and i think the part for this one will always be my favorite. also last little bit but theres so much about identity in toa as well and the way the main character, luke, is written with his own struggles about feeling like his own person has gripped me to this day. ive heard this one is hard to find a physical copy of but like. again shoot me a message if u have a hacked 3ds

3. AI: The Somnium Files

i've been here since day ONE (not exactly but theres a youtube page for one of the characters they were using to drop some info before the game released and i was watching while that was still going so. close enough). i am obsessed with aitsf. my icon is even the main character (edited a bit and w/ stickers). this game doesn't have combat like the first to and is strictly a visual novel and i adore the way it explores the central theme of love, especially familial love and its many shapes and forms and how sometimes even through blood it just doesnt. exist. but that doesnt mean you dont deserve love. someone will be there to give it to you and if not you take it however you can. this is much more apparent in the left half of the game which to this day has made the mizuki route my favorite. this one's eveywhere (playstation, steam, switch) and goes on sale frequently on steam for like $7. this one also has a sequel which is pretty good but again i think the original is much better

4. Heaven Will Be Mine

honestly with how many people i see daily gushing over poetry and writing im surprised more dont play hwbm. its a space mecha visual novel set in the aftermath of a war where earth sent children to go fight an existential threat which may not have even existed and now all of those kids are adults who have grown up without the shackles of society on the earth which js funny enough, finally calling for them to come back. the writing is beautiful and fun to pick apart and if you're a fan of prose i definitely think you should give this one a try. double of you're lgbt in any way this game is good for its writing about queerness especially if you're trans. please play hwbm. this one's on steam and doesnt have a sequel game but the devs, worst girl games, also made We Know The Devil which i like less than hwbm but its still pretty good! that ones got gay religious trauma

continuing is just a list of more i like in no specific order. some of these may be a bit cringey but i like fun

Witch's Heart

listen i know theres some strange bias some ppl have gainst rpgmaker pixel games but like. 1) odd but ok 2) witch's heart is such a beatiful story i need you to throw whatever biases you may have abt pixel games RIGHT NOW. my header text comes from this game. it means everything to me. do you have a wish you would kill for? does your wish mean more to you than another's? how much will you let your selfishness control you. for a game that looks so silly it made me cry a lot. this one's free on vgperson's translated game list and theres still MORE BEING MADE. SO MUCH GAME. FOR FREE. LOOK AT ME. ITS FREE. and heartwrenching.

To The Moon/Finding Paradise/ Impostor Factory

this description is short but similarly a pixel game like the previous rec. its more understandably heavy considering you play as eva and neil who fulfill the wishes of the dying in their dreams. its sad. i cried. i cry a lot dont i? these r on steam

Just Shapes and Beats

a rhythm game this time! it's got a cute little story mode but it is just a dubstep rhythm bullet hell i like playing. did you know i was a dubstep fan in middle school well now you do and im sad skrillex is mid now. its on steam and switch. not a good pick however if you are sensitive to flashing lights or have epilepsy im sorry. i believe there are safe modes but i havent tested them myself to see how well they work

Paranormasight

paranormasight is a horror visual novel illustrated by gen kobayashi who, if you can tell from the linework on the sprites and in the portraits and what have you, illustrated for twewy. i'll be real i was ready to screan and cry 30 minutes in but its not actually that scary im just a wimp. this one could be seen in a similar vein with witch's heart in the idea of: what would you do to fulfill your greatest wish. how many people would you kill. because you will be killing. on steam and switch.

Bustafellows

for being an otome bustafellows rly got me. while being an otome it is still plenty silly but heavy with fun characters. also i think this is the first time ive really liked an otome mc they tend to be very waify and kinda annoyingly written tbh but teuta is a VERY fun character and not at all a stand in for a self insert. or at least she isnt good at being a self insert which is fine to me because i love a main character that has their own personality. a guy dies like 10 minutes in. this ones on steam

Mamiya

i seem to like a lot of visual novel games with time loops and dead main characters and this is another one. very dark but i love it to bits. also this one requires a warning list i haven't seen anywhere but i made one myself here. its on steam

IVE RUN OUT OF PICTURES. SO I CANT ADD ANYMORE BUT QUICK LIST YOU'LL HAVE TO LOOK UP MORE OR JUST ASK ME ABT ANY OF THESE:

Lethal League Blaze

Hatoful Boyfriend

Fallen Hero: Rebirth (and its sequel Retribution)

Code Vein

shout out also to What in Hell is Bad. not for kids at all this one is explicitly 18+ but for being a goofy eroge otome it has. gripped my by the nuts and it has not let go. ive only been playing like a month help.

[josecariohca]

hi again! hope you're in good health! your answer to the pirate au gave me life, if you ever wanna share more/info-dump about it I'll be happy to take a seat and listen. Since we have similar brain worms about them and it seems you've been on the spamano block even longer than I have I was wondering if you have any fic recs for them? (side note do you have an ao3?) or just any type of rec for spamano at all?

hi again!!! you must have the patience of a saint for waiting so long, but yes hello i am here and i have been DYING to answer your ask and once again i stuck it under a read more bc what is concise wording??? idk her shes not here we only ramble here! warnings for excessive over-explanation and the obsessive thoughts of someone who has been in this stupid fandom for way, way too long.

i also wanted to address the super sweet notes you wrote on your original ask that had me smiling like an absolute fool, btw!!!! so first off: THANK YOU AND IM SO GLAD YOU AGREE!!!!! listen, the canon dynamic between these two has always given me a very severe case of brain rot, and the ways in which that dynamic can be removed from canon and smacked into any au is just soooooo juicy. and while yes i do adore airhead spain with all my heart, i do see it as very reductive to his character and who he actually is. and this also kinda bleeds into answering this ask, so yay! two birds one stone!

my entire thing with these two is the fact that spain is, at his core, an empire. god, gold, glory. that was his whole thing, ruthlessly so. and while yes i do believe the nations dont personify their governments and instead represent the best of their people, it would be foolish to ignore what it means for spain (and antonio) to be the spanish empire, bloody, greedy, damned, troubled, all of it. and that bleeds a lot into how i imagine antonio to be!

antonio (and spain) will always carry a lot of guilt to me. he acts sweet and bubble and sunshiny, and i do think he genuinely is that way naturally, but a lot of it is also an attempt to distance himself from what he used to be, either from guilt, from wanting others to forget, or for whatever reason. who he is in current day is not who he was, but its still there and it is something he grapples with constantly. so, in the vein of my pirate au, antonio as a pirate is someone who is angry.

hes angry at the world, hes angry at his government, hes angry at the state of life for anyone who isnt wealthy and born into generational status, hes angry at the favoritism, at the restrictions, at everything. hes someone who wants freedom. spain as a character doesnt like to be restrained, hated his forced job of folding flowers, hated he couldnt do more when he was once so powerful (to the point where america even said anytime spain was near him hed try and hit him with his knees, so clearly he knows how to hold a grudge) and antonio would feel a lot of resentment to the state of the world as it exists around him but unable to change it—until he can

and lovino, who is angry but for so many other reasons. lovino, who is born into a gilded cage that he cant even touch, lovino, whose entire life was built around his younger (legitimate) brother who will one day inherit everything his grandfather passes on that lovino cannot have, even if they do love him, even if they do cherish him and give him an education and steady work and a comfortable life. but thats not enough, and why would it be? his name is worthless in this society. he barely exists outside of his small family, and whenever he's there, there is always the elephant in the room of none of this is mine, none of this will ever be mine. so yes hes angry, hes resentful, but hes also stuck. where can he go, realistically, when this is all hes ever known? and he loves his family. hes loyal, hes caring, he adores his family. he just also resents them because they are everything he can never be. (and i do throw seborga into the brothers. they are a trio to me and they always will be!)

so when they meet, when antonio sees this little angry brat with so much pent up aggression start barking insults at him in front of his own crew, how can he not be fascinated by that? and he sees someone wearing a shiny family crest of a prominent venetian family, and its so easy to him. take him, maybe teach him some respect, dump him in italy, get some money, and fuck off to the ocean again for the next prize.

and it would work if they both werent so fucking stupid at the same time. bc just like romano and spain, these two are two sides of the same dumb ass spectrum. angry and hopeful with different styles of attachment that fit just perfectly enough to make it feel clandestine. two people who could just so happen to understand where the other is coming from, with enough understanding to get it. and suddenly theyre not so different after all, are they, considering they both got screwed over in life, forced into roles they didnt want until someone gave them an out, until they give each other an out.

and then it becomes a lot less about stealing from the world and keeping it for themselves as it is giving each other the world, wealth and riches that belong to them and them alone, an open ear and willing hands and the understanding that antonio would rip the stars from the sky and temper raging oceans for lovino if he asked, hoping only for lovino to love him in return and choose to stay, to seek freedom and something different.

its entirely selfish and dangerous and doomed to fail from the start, which we as people in 2024 know, but its romantic in its desperation and honest in how actual real life pirates were furious with their lives and were entirely fucked over after the war of spanish succession, and while yes most of those pirates were english (and arthur is a big player in this story too, obvi), spain did have its fair share, esp in retaliation to what the english were doing to spanish treasure ships.

WOW that was a lot im so sorry for how long that is. i hope it is in some way understandable and not just rambling jibberish fghjkjh as for fic recs!!! babe how much time to do you bc i have like. thousands. ill start with my favorite few though, and maybe youll find something you like in them!

some are long, some are short, some are not as much romantic as they are doomed and haunted, and some are nauseatingly sweet, but its a range of stuff. let me know what you like and im sure i can tailor these more to your tastes!

in no particular order, some of my all time favs:

those who loved us all along by aalesundbren

the problem with being known by baybetime

the bocca della verità duology by nyoengland

ravish by ludwiggle73 (spamano isnt the main pair, its second to fruk, but its a good fic nonetheless)

underneath the gilded lights by kai_maciel (spamano is a very small part of this, its mainly centered around latam and portugal, but the parts they do have are cute and i love how spain is characterized. it has a second part with a few other spamano bits, if youre interested)

anything that champagnesly has ever written about spamano. one of my all time favorite authors, even if they havent been in the fandom in a very long time. their wine verse is a personal fav and i read it when i was younger and i still go back to read it now. same for oblivion, the blue hours, and tbh anything else spamano theyve ever written

we are all businessmen by soliloquium

tesoro mio by (they orphaned the fic, i do know who the author is but since its orphaned idk if they want me to say their name???? either way, great fic!)

more than attraction by whitetyger12

and finally, anything mareepysheepy has ever written for spamano, with a particular shout out to give and take

okay, thats all ill do for now. i have so many fic recs that ive accumulated over the years for this pairing, but hopefully you find something somewhere in this mess that you end up enjoying. sorry again for the wait and i hope this made up for it!!!!

you are a delight to my day and THANK YOU for allowing me to ramble endlessly about my stupid pirates

[lesbianpegbar]

IS LINK CLICK GOOD AGAIN WAS RHE FINAL GOOD

okay god so. this is complicated. i'm keeping this spoiler free lol, but i wrote an essay so if you dont wanna read that tldr this season wasn't good and this episode retains those overall issues but left me with enough intrique that im still invested if incredibly cautious and heavily jaded

i have suchhhh mixed feelings on this final episode and on season 2 as a whole. having slept on it and letting the euphoria wear off a bit, the episode as a whole was like. fine. it was emblematic of a lot of the issues ive had with the whole season so far. i think the pacing wasnt great, i think we spent way too long on flashbacks, and oh my god the fight scenes were far far too long (looking at one in particular like i did not care about those characters or their relationship). but the ending of the episode, at least in the moment, made me forget all about that and all about the problems with the whole season. it focused back on the main trio, and we saw interactions between them that made me remember why i love these characters and why i loved season 1. and there was a reveal at the end that, when watching, made me quite frankly go absolutely ape shit insane and feel like i was dying so. lol

but again, sleeping on it, while the end of the episode was a reminder of what i loved, it feels a bit hollow when placed in the context of the rest of the season. i think of how crazy the reveal was last night for me, but then i wonder how much more intense and meaningful it wouldve been had we actually spent the last 12 episodes exploring these characters instead of speedrunning a plot that nobody really cared about. in that way, it almost feels a bit insulting? that's kind of harsh, but idk how else to put it lol. like they had this great idea and strung us along with the bare minimum while making some of the worst writing decisions ive ever seen, and then finally at the end are like "hey! remember this thing! remember! arent we smart and clever and good writers!" and its just. sigh.

i think about what we couldve had had we spent this season with lu guang and cheng xiaoshi. if we had been shown them interacting more than maybe two times this season. if we had spent less time on fight scenes and cops and murder drama and actually spent time on the characters that i watched season 1 for. this season feels like something that shouldve been a film or half a season, if it even really needed to exist at all. it feels like they were twiddling their thumbs for twelve episodes because they just wanted to set up li tianchen and the big reveal at the end. and in that way its a huge disappointment, and a bit of an insult. they made me watch twelve episodes of something that feels like they barely thought about just so they could move on to their greater plot in the last five minutes of the season. this whole season feels like it was a stepping stone, a minor or transitory plot point in a greater story, which is a little iffy considering we all waited for two years just for something that felt like it barely mattered.

all in all, this season in general has just left a bad taste in my mouth. the conflict arises bc what they do get right makes me want to keep watching. i care about lu guang and cheng xiaoshi and qiao ling, like a lot. and with the reveal they did last night i want to see what's happening and there's a part of me that feels vindicated for being right about certain plot elements. am i falling for a shitty carrot on a stick? yeah, kinda, and that feels a little gross. i'll watch season 3 when it comes out and we'll see from there. i want to believe they'll turn it around and maybe now that they've gotten all this plot bullshit out of the way they'll refocus on cheng xiaoshi and lu guang, and maybe then we can all look back on this season and laugh and say "oh yeah that season sucks lol but the rest of it is so good so we just ignore it." at this point that's kind of best case scenario. which isn't a glowing review but play stupid games win stupid prizes i guess

[spamgyu]

Hi love,

Alright, I'll start off with this, the wonwoo fluff, girl, I hope you know that good fluff IS about the most mundane things and yeah, you got me all giggly while reading this one, so I'd say you're fucking good at writing fluff( as if your pretty boy series isn't enough proof of that).

Next, the Alex Kwon update, it's absolutely hilarious, but the way I can totally see this happening, like, alex having to pay them to stay away from Alex!yn and telling her they're all red flags. Also, Andrew, Sam and Chris not being on his close friends, loll, girl I was laughing reading them complain. The cutest thing though, the Alex or alex✨️ was so adorable and I loved the update, it felt like early compensation for the pain you're about to put us through with the hoshi idol angst.

Now, minghao with lv, god I've been wanting to see this happen for so long but oh god, ge looked so gooooood. Seeing him Jackson makes me so happy, I love seeing the members interact with their friends. You see, I have quite a weird connection, I started off as a bts and blackpink fan, got to know Jackson through namjoon and then svt through jungkook, so watching all these groups interact is like my source of happiness. When I tell you, I was over the moon seeing lisa and mingyu interact, they're absolutely hilarious, the way gyu looked so done with her while she seemed to have the time of her life annoying him. Sorry, I got distracted, the whole point is Hao looked absolutely fucking amazing in that denim on denim look.

Okay, I see people talking about how they can't afford to stan more then one group, and I totally get that, like I have serious brainrot because of stanning more than one group(can't say I regret it though). To give you an idea of how deep my brainrot runs, I stan 5 groups, 4 boy bands and 1 girl group. When I tell you that I'm rotting, I mean I genuinely am, because just one grp is enough to drive someone crazy and yet, I choose to do so with 5 groups. The fact that I started off as a cubic doesn't help my case either, because I was instantly drawn to these 13 men being unhinged. It's been years and I still haven't gotten used to this, and to be quite honest, idk if I ever will.

As for disconnected calls part 2, umm, I would actually love you even more if it was angst(just a personal opinion) but like, I can't guarantee I'll be alive to tell you how much I love it, because, well, cheol angst is one of my weaknesses, I can't say I've fully recovered from the pain from the 1st part and the apartment we don't share.

Anyway, how have you been?

hi omg – wow im so late replying buuuut

thank u i KDNWKD i think i think too much about fluff bc ??? idk ?? i hate cheesy things and i feel like people wont like what i think is cute so then i never actually go through with it but AHHH THANK U

alex kwon just dont want the boys annoying him in the gc bc lbr the guys wont ever comment or swipe up on Alex!yn bc like theyre dumb but theyre not pigs... anyways its alex's way of not wanting to show his lover boy side to the boys

i loooveeddd the denim look sm and i loooove when we get svt interactions with other idols (imo it humanizes them) anywaysss

KFNENF yeah i stan multiple groups and im mostly casual stan for all but svt (but tbh some carats may think im casual for svt bc i dont really go crazy with purchasing merch) anyways now that it's concert season my pockets are HURTING

LASTLY disconnected calls pt2 will be angst and maybe equally as painful as the apartment we wont share....... i havent fully written out ehe BUT NOTED

also i am.......... okay ish.... work is.... work and i am ....... surviving lmfaoooo

[gamergal-ds]

HOW 2 MOD MAD RAT DEAD ON SWITCH! PART 1: MUSIC!

If at any point you need more information or further assistance, drop me an ask or direct message! Even if it's something 'stupid' don't worry, I'll help :)

What you'll need:

A copy of the game in .nsp or .xci format

Switch Explorer

Sonic Audio Tools

VGAudio

Audacity (My recommendation, alternatives may work)

Switch explorer is used to extract the files from the game to be modded

Sonic audio tools is used to extract the .acb archives the songs (.hca files) are packed in, and to pack the files back in

VGAudio is used to convert the .hca files (the actual audio files) to .wav to be opened and edited in audacity, and to convert them back to .hca before being repacked

Lastly, audacity is used to edit the .wav files to put whatever you want into the files, completely replace it's contents or whatever, go wild

Did any of that make sense to you? no? Good, keep reading.

LET'S GET THIS SHOW ON THE ROAD!

I'll add like a pastebin link here later with every song's internal number so you can easily find the one you're looking for and extract it, too lazy right now tho :P

Open switch explorer, choose to load up your nsp/xci of the game (file > open) and navigate to data > sound

then, find the song you wish to edit and right click > extract file, then drop it in a good spot for later

Afterwards, open two file explorer windows, one in the sonic audio tools folder and the other where you extracted the .acb file. We do this so you can easily drag the .acb into the ACBeditor.exe found in the sonic audio tools folder:

this will produce a folder in the same directory as the .acb sharing its name, and inside you will find your .hca files:

these are the actual audio files, but we can't edit them yet, because no program knows what to do with a .hca! First, we need to convert them to .wav files, so boot up VGAudio, click open file, pick the .hca file (you need to repeat this process for all 4+ files), choose to convert to WAVE and hit save file.

wherever you saved it, you now have a .wav of the audio file, feel free to give it a listen! If it's just silence, don't worry, some of the songs are like that.

Now these files require a little explanation, the one ending in 0 to 2 are all related to the song's into, opening, and cut scene loops, basically everything you stop hearing once you've started playing the level properly. The file ending in a 3 is the main loop, the part that plays so long as you keep playing through the level. In some rare cases, there will be even more files, or less! I haven't done enough of my own research yet, so you can come to your own conclusions on those, shouldn't be hard to figure out once you get how these work.

Anyways, now that that's outta the way, audacity time! Individually open, edit, and export each .wav you extracted, again as .wav (keep the file name the same!) using audacity, make any changes you want, import other files of any format into it on a new track and remove the original when you're done, whatever, but I recommend keeping the lenght (not filesize) of the audio file the same, idk if the game will have a stroke if it's too long or not long enough. (Also a lot of the song info like BPM is hardcoded so any old song won't work if you just drop it in here, stick to mad rat monday songs for your first edits like I did, those work the best, but do be ready to splice them to extend the main loop (file 3)) (also line it up properly, it can't be off beat from the original, you gotta find a point in the songs where the waveform is similar and use it to line it up exactly right)

This part's kinda all up to you, but I can provide some basic audacity tips specific to your situation if required. Or just general ones, if you can't wrap your head around audacity :P

once they're all edited, use VGAudio to reverse the process, open the .wav files and choose to convert to HCA, and save them, maybe backup the original .hca files instead of replacing them if you want to (i just added an 'og' to the start of the original file's name)

then, remove all the junk from the folder besides the new .hca files you made (or move them to another, identically named folder separately), and drag the folder into the same acbeditor.exe from the sonic audio tools folder, just like you did with the acb the first time. It will pack your folder back into an acb in the same directory as the folder you dragged in (it'll replace the original if you kept them all in the same directory, but don't worry you can just extract the file again if you need the original). Now, we set up the mod!

This part's easy, just make a new folder with the name of your mod, in there make one named romfs, in there make one named data, and in there make one named sound, then drop your new acb file into the sound folder. The mod's done! Drag it into the mod directory on your real switch (idk how that works I don't have a modded switch) or in yuzu right click mad rat dead, choose open mod directory and drop the mod folder in there. Then right click the game, hit properties, and the mod should show up with the name you chose for the top folder. Here's some screenshots for all that:

Tick the box to enable the mod and boot up the game! That's it!

If you need any more help, further assistance, suggestions, anything, just drop me an ask or DM, I'll respond in due time! Additionally, if you have any suggestions or requests for how to improve this guide, let me know with a reply!

Happy modding everyone!

[prosa2002]

The whole don't touch a baby rabbit thing is a myth just fyi in case you didn't know! The meat eating rabbit thing is a cool idea for a character though, what do they look like

This is a reference to a reblog of mine on a post about sharing your fursonas, in which I left these tags: #a cat fish#as in a cat but with fish features#not really a fursona cause they're more cat-girl ish than full anthropomorphic animal#but i could turn her into a fursona if i tried#i have two unrelated to me that are a rat with a split swen-shut stomach based on a dead mouse that entered my room and got caught in a trap#and one of those really fluffy rabbits with long fur#except he is based on how rabbit mother will eat their babies if theyre touched by humans#so this one survived being eaten but became a meat eater as a consequence#hes nice enough to not do cannibalism... but he could

(I wrote most of this on my new phone, where autocorrect doesn't work. So I'll take this chance to also remind people english is not my first language.)

Okay, didn't know that. But the whole idea was because I was interested in how an herbivore animal would resource to eat flesh specifically to eat their children.

I went to read about it right now and it happens due to something wrong with the babies (they're gonna die) or something wrong with the mom (shes gonna die and be unable to care for them or she lacks nutrients), so its something related to it being a last resource... oh well.

Anyways, here's the character (this is from 2 years ago, so it's traditional art, and i can't scan it, so I edited it instead :/)

He sometimes wears a mask to hide his mouth because it is full of sharp teeth. And idk if its visible in the picture, but he has some sort of thin shawl in his waist, which is the last thing his mom left behind. (BTW, I make all my male characters a bit androgynous/fem cause when i decided to learn how to draw guys I focused on what i wanted to look like and now i cant stop drawing them like this :/)

Anyways, his story is that he's part of a species of anthropomorphic rabbits (humans exist in this world too, I dont remember if i made other species canon, just rabbits plus an hare character), but a specific kind (visually based on angora rabbits) that lives isolated from human society.

Basically his mom ventured too far from her village and had to take shelter in the residence of a human. She gave birth there, the human touched the children at some point out of concern and... things happened and he only was capable of saving one.

What I came up with was that her kind got isolated from humans for a reason, in this case a curse, and that making contact with a human at that age is enough to mess the antro bunny up. He grew sharp teeth and basically can barely eat typical rabbit food, actually even preferring rabbit flesh (having in mind normal non-antro rabbits exist). He was raised by that same human. I don't remember what I came up in relation to that.

Also, there are other kinds of antro rabbits in this universe without this kind of problem.

Anyways, he goes on a search to find his mom again. However, the catch is that not even his mom nor any of his kind are aware of why they avoid humans, and his mom thought that the human had killed all her children (cause her clothes had blood in them) and that the trauma made her forget. So she's not even aware she ate her children.

It's kinda fucked, I'm noticing now that I'm writing this down.

Disclaimer: This is not my typical type of art. I sometimes draw non human characters, but I prefer to draw my characters looking relatively human. From the top of my head, this character, two moth related ones and one rat one are the only furry characters i created with a fully set design, out of my hundreds of human ones. So basically, dont expect this type of art much. (Or any art at all, I'm lazy and i dont post anything here 😓)