#GOD. why are relationships are so hard

[stardustanddaffodils]

i love being genuine i love being friendly i love being excited and loving and open and wearing my heart on my sleeve i want to be like sunshine to the people in my life i want to be bright and warm and welcoming and if im too warm or too bright for some then we can cross paths and go our separate ways and if i am the spot of sunshine that others are looking for i hope they will welcome it and reciprocate it and stay with it, with me, for as long as they'd like or as long as they need or for as long as we can last.

[erytherion]

Reading the webtoon and…

Does this imply that Kim Dokja also tried to write a questionnaire for her to fill in since she wouldn’t speak to him, that either he 1) never gave her in the end (especially if he couldn’t find her after she was released) or 2) gave it to her and she STILL refused to answer?

Because that is so so so so awful. It was already bad but if he tried so many ways to get her to speak and she still gave him no response, regardless of her reasoning… isn’t that still directly choosing to cut herself fully out of his life? Why in the hell did she lie for his sake and allow him to visit her if she wanted to never speak to him again?

I know everyone claims Kim Dokja is just like her in sacrificing himself for loved ones, but at least he tries his best to stay with them and to keep them in his life. He still chooses sacrifice, but it’s not because he intends to never return. He always returns (even if much later than planned).

The only time this differs is with 51%, when he STILL tried his best to stay with them - at least as much as he could.

I sometimes like Lee Sookyung, but I am mostly still SO mad at her for completely ignoring her child since he was 8 years old. Especially when he must have looked like shit any number of times from being mistreated and bullied by family, friends, army, employers.

But maybe that’s just the fragment in me being eternally pissed with her. She DOES love him, but like he says in the webtoon in this chapter - maybe such truths are painful enough to be false anyways, because they’re just SUCH bullshit. That’s not how affection should work, if you actually care about someone and want them to be happy.

[yellowocaballero]

Been a fan of your fics for YEARS. I was just telling my friend how despite how much I read fics I never actually love them, with some of your fics (especially TMA) as the exception. Felt the need to reread some of them and saw you reblogged some ISAT fanart. So. Any thoughts on ISAT you'd like to share?

Hope you have a wonderful day!! So happy I found your fics again!!

I avoided answering this for a while because I was trying to think of a way to cohesively and coherently vocalize my thoughts on In Stars and Time. I have given up because I don't want to hold everybody here all day and I have accepted that my thoughts are just pterodactyl screeching.

I love it so much. I have so much to say on it. It drove me bonkers for like a week straight. I have AUs. It's absolute Megbait. They're just a little Snufkin and they're having the worst experience of anybody's life. Ludonarratives my fucking beloved.

I am going to talk about the prologue.

The prologue is such a fascinating experience. You crack open the game and immediately begin checking off all of the little genre boxes: mage, warrior, researcher, you're the rogue...some little kid who's there for some reason...alright, you know the score. You're in yet another indie Earthbound RPG, these are your generic characters, let's get the ball rolling.

Except then you realize that these characters are people. You feel instantly how you've entered the game at its last dungeon, at the end of the adventure. They have their own in-jokes, histories, backgrounds, adventures. They get along well and they're obviously close, but not in a twee or unrealistic way. They have so much chemistry and spirit and life. I fell in love with them so quickly.

But Sif doesn't. Sif kind of hates them, because they will not stop saying the same damn thing. They walk the same paths, do the same things, make the same jokes, expect Sif to say the same lines. They keep referencing a Sif we do not see, with jokes we never see him make and heroic personality he never shows - they reference a Sif who is dead - and Sif can't handle that, so he kills them too.

They become only an exercise in tedious frustration. Sif button mashes through their dialogue, Sif mindlessly clicks the same dialogue options, Sif skips through the tutorial, Sif blows through the puzzles. Sif turns their world into a video game. Sif is playing a generic RPG. Sif forgets their names. They are no longer people with in-jokes, histories, backgrounds, adventures. They're the mage, the warrior, the researcher, and...some random kid.

I did not understand the Kid's presence at first. I had no idea what they contributed to the game. They didn't do anything. As a party member in a video game, they're a bit useless. Why is the Kid there?

Because Sif's life isn't a video game. Because the kid isn't 'the kid'. They're Bonnie. Bonnie, who the party loves. Why is Bonnie there? Because they love them. There is no room for Bonnie in the boring RPG that Sif is playing. And then you realize that Sif is wrong, and that they've lost something extremely important, and that they'll never escape without it.

Watching the prologue before watching ISAT gave ISAT the most unique air of dread and horror, because you crack open ISAT and you see the person Sif used to be. You realize that Sif used to be a person. Sif used to be the person who made jokes, who gave real smiles, who interacted with the world as if they are a part of it. And you know you are sitting down to watch Sif lose everything that made them a person, to lose everything that made them a member of this world, and turn them into a character in a video game who doesn't understand the point of Bonnie at all.

At the climax of the game, when the others realize that something is deeply wrong and that Sif physically cannot tell them, they realize that there is nothing they can do. So Bonnie declares snacktime. And for the first time they have snacktime.

What is snacktime? Classic JRPGs don't have snacktime. There's literally no point to a snacktime - not in a video game, and not in Sif's terrible life. It's not fixing this, because nothing can fix this. But Bonnie gives Sif a cookie and Sif eats it.

It's meaningless. It's a cutscene. It didn't save Sif and it didn't change a thing. It will make no difference in the end.

But it did make the difference. It made all of the difference in the world. Bonnie is a character who you really don't understand the point of before you realize that Bonnie was the entire point.

ISAT is about comfort media. Why do we play the same video games over and over again? Why do we avoid watching the finale of our favorite shows? What is truly comforting: a story with no conflict, or a story where you always know what is about to happen? Do you want to live in a scary, uncontrollable world, or do you want to play Stardew Valley? Do you want a person or a character?

When I beat Earthbound for the first time (and if you don't know, the prologue/ISAT battle system is just Mother) and watched the ending cutscene where the characters part ways and say goodbye...I felt a little bit sad. I wanted them to be together forever. But that's something only characters could ever be.

[k3nnysh0utt]

Falsesymmetry yippee

I have very mixed feelings about the first one ill probably remove it if i decide i hate it later

[crescentfool]

not indicative of anything, just something silly i thought about! feel free to fill in the variables with whatever you like.

[backseatloversz]

i hate you stranger things i hate you duffer brothers & co i hate you plausible deniability i hate you queerbaiting i hate you queer subtext i hate you pop culture i hate you straight people i hate you netflix social media managers i hate you i hate you i hate you

[labyrynth]

ok so your first problem was assuming mdzs is a story where Good People are Rewarded and Bad People are Punished.

your second problem was assuming that MXTX—who goes out of her way to showcase unresolved, tragic, undeserved endings in all of her works—would ever write a story with such a shallow notion of “deserving.”

the only reason wangxian makes it out unscathed is because they’re literally the protagonists. authorial intent and plot armor ensure their happy ending. that’s it.

[toastybugguy]

I need all the cis gay men who say shit like “UNFORTUNATELY I like men” and all the trans men who say shit like “gender isn’t a choice, you think I’d CHOOSE to be a man ELL OH ELL” to Shut the fuck up actually please! Thanks! Why are we constantly repackaging ways to be ashamed of our queerness! I love being a trans man, I love being attracted to men, I celebrate it, even! Retreat into your little cave of misery and leave the rest of us alone!

[ganondoodle]

consider this a vent post

[leofrith]

once again thinking about how eivor is pretty stoic about death throughout most of the game up until hamtunscire, at which point she's suddenly reacting more emotionally than we've ever seen her. she's screaming for soma and she's crying over hunwald, and she sounds like she's straight up dissociating her way through that conversation with guthrum before the funeral. and she's never really reacted emotionally in that way before with the exception of her openly crying over ceolbert's tomb because this is the first time she's watched loved ones die without the comfort that comes from knowing she will see them again in valhalla. because she no longer believes in a valhalla. i am going to scream <3

[human-adjacent]

i desperately need dazai’s pre-mafia backstory because what the fuck are you talking about!!!! what happened to you!!!

[winepresswrath]

An important thing about Aziraphale is that he cares so much about being good, but also, he is only ok at it. Not terrible! Just mediocre. Very brave and trying his absolute best with mixed results. To paraphrase the book, neither fundamentally good nor fundamentally bad but fundamentally Aziraphale. He is however trying very hard to save the entire planet and that is really very lovely of him and should count for a lot, especially because his hot not-boyfriend finally made a move after six thousand horny, horny years and he could easily have chosen to get really spectacularly laid instead of reviewing organizational flowcharts and being trapped in meetings with people who hate each other only slightly less than they hate him.

[venti-tangents]

!! spoilers for current event under cut !!

What a rollercoaster lmao. I feel the disagreement creeping up on me but--I enjoyed reading about Clavis inserting drama into his own relationship only for it bite him in the ass. I will not lie, he did almost push my 'ick' button in this event, which is why I'm surprised I ended up likening it.

Watching Clavis realize his mistake and try his best to learn form it and fix things was so so so cute and swoon worthy i love him so much. I do love the running theme that Cybrid has going on with post-route Clavis stories, where he screws up and learns form it. It's refreshing to see romantic media portray a man who isn't 'fixed' after getting into a relationship.

[lith-myathar]

.

[rosykims]

they make me so fucking insane. absolutely bananas mode

[a-flickering-soul]

imagine creating the most insane bi4bi platonic codependent pair of assholes to ever exist and they snipe at each other constantly and are perfect mirrors of each others' flaws and strengths and could never live without the other person. and then you make them kiss. to be clear i absolutely mean this in a negative way.