#Level Map Display (trope)

[inspectorspacetimerevisited]

Anytime a map is displayed,

be prepared for it to be out-of-date and, therefore, useless.

[duckyfruitbat]

Retro Review: War of the Monsters

Happy Birthday to me

Happy Birthday from me

Ducky you feeling good, you're kinda singing to yourself? Please don't cry again.

That's right friends and lovers, my birthday is coming up! Instead of just eating a whole cake by myself, I decided to do a review of a game from my childhood, while eating said cake by myself. Now what to play what to play? Well if you read the title you'd know I'm looking at a brawler released for the PS2 by Incognito Entertainment back in 2003, War of the Monsters.

You see one day my dad got a PS2 demo disc with said game on it. It had one map and two playable characters, but my brother and I constantly played that game until the disc broke. We loved seeing the monsters, the destruction physics, and just the atmosphere of an old monster movie. Obviously our parents swiped up the full game when they saw a copy in the store. It was the first game I ever completed, and I played it constantly. With the preamble out of the way, it's time to actually play the damn thing.

Everything about this game, from the intro video, the box art, to even the instruction manual is just one big loving homage to the old giant monster movies of the fifties and sixties. The box art is very reminiscent of the hand painted movie posters, and the manual is presented as a news magazine with the same name as the in game newspaper that is shown in the intro video.

The story is that in the fifties Earth is being invaded by an alien race known as the Zorgulons. Things are looking grim until the top scientist of the world develop a series EMP devices referred to as the secret weapons. They are placed all throughout the world and when they are activated the invading fleet is crippled and saucers are crashing down all around the globe. Victory is nearly declared when there is an unexpected side effect to the saucers leaking fuel tanks. The fuel has a mutagen effect turning all sorts of animals, people, and even stone into giant rampaging monsters. That's all established in the intro video, it's full of old movie tropes too.

Heading into the main menu, it's in a drive in movie theater with most things displayed on a screen. I have to say, this old movie thing really does give it a nice charm. There's even black and white footage of gameplay on the screen. Now time to select a character for the story campaign.

There are ten playable monsters, two are unlockable and each one has four alternate skins, with number four usually being the most out there design. Here's a list of said monsters.

(Fake name (Real Name))

Walmart brand Godzilla (Togera)

Beeg bug (Preytor)

Royalty free King Kong (Congar)

Liberty Prime (Robo-47)

Murder Tiki (Agamo)

Voltron (Ultra V)

Four Arms but Lava (Magmo)

Zappy Bitch (Kineticlops)

Dragon (Raptros)

Yip-yip With a Gun (Zorgulon)

I decided to go with Kineticlops because it was one of the two monsters available on the demo, so why not relive that? Also I had this image of one guy in a studio wearing a mo-cap suit with an eye painted on his chest while surrounded by people in rubber monster suits, and that made me giggle.

First level is against Congar in Mid-Town Park. I think it's based on New York, a bit hard to tell. Any way, the opening shot gives you an idea of the monsters story being a massive territorial dispute against each other along with their constant encounters with the military trying to either capture or kill each monster. Here we begin the battles!

Congar was the easiest one, and here I noticed that there are little health pick-ups across the map. You can pick them up at any point, but so can the other monsters. I also noticed that instead of an invisible wall, or weirdly indestructible buildings, the boundaries are marked by the secret weapon emitting a force field around the map. Nice little touch, and is used in all but one level. Now fighting Congar was just laying into him until he kicks the bucket. As we're battling the destruction physics come into play as buildings get caught up in the mayhem. As they crumble, all sorts of debris falls to the ground and becomes a usable item to either throw or use as a club, same for any vehicles around. I also found a truck that explodes on impact, so I threw that at Harambe in order to curse humanity for another hundred years as he burns alive. First level done!

Second level is Gambler Gulch, a legally distinct Vegas. Here I have to fight Togera, after he handles some military vehicles. I just start laying into him like before, but here is when I notice that these monsters have a self preservation instinct. If they get low enough health they start making a b-line towards any health nearby. Lucky for me there was some rubble that I could throw at him and I managed to take him out that way. This is where the military starts inserting itself into the players campaign. Once Togera is defeated, a Platoon of tanks and attack helicopters come through the map barrier and are followed by Robo-47. Yeah the robots are all military meant to defend humanity against the monsters and the aliens as seen later on. This one was a bit harder to get through because of the military taking shots at me, but I managed and the warranty won't be covering this.

The third level also has the first boss in Rosdale Canyon. An obvious homage to Roswell and area 51. First thing to get through is a barrage of mutant ants which are actually one of the alternate skins of Preytor. Their health is lower than other monsters, so the only real challenge is their numbers. With the ants out of the way we see the first boss landing atop the military base, Goliath Prime.

He starts the fight by lobbing bombs at you from behind a forcefield, the coward! The way to bring him down is to throw those bombs back at him. Eventually he falls off his pedestal and you must fight him in hand to hand combat. This is where you realize that he hits Hard. He has two pistols that he fires at you but he also has a charge attack and a spinning attack that knocked me across the map. This bot really spanked me, but I eventually came out on top as the dom I am.

Fourth level is in Metro City, the other New York level. This one is against Preytor and a resurrected Congar. The military has rebuilt him and are now having him do their bidding. This is where the difficulty starts climbing. Whenever going against two or more monsters they will team up against you, and often one will keep you busy while the other tries to get you. In these cases I had to start focusing on one and ignore the other. This also left me vulnerable to attack. Managed to defeat them and became the ruler of Metrocity!

Fifth level is Century Airfield where two Raptros are terrorizing the planes trying to leave. They are a pain to deal with, the previous issue with teams applies, but with the added issue of them flying around me. Managed to get them with one life left.

Level six is Atomic Island, a nuclear power plant that looks like it can power half the country. This one starts as another barrage of Kineticlops. I am now forced to fight my own kin. Here is where the environment starts giving options beyond throwing rubble and cars. There's a button I was able to ground bound that released hot, radio active liquid into the lower area. As I sat there watching my brothers melt into the sludge I wonder to myself how it came to this. I looked over the pile of corpses in mo-cap suits rotting away in the radioactive lake and hang on what's with that alarm? My thoughts were cut short as a meltdown happened and the environment changed to the next boss arena in a crater.

The boss is a three headed carnivorous plant named Vegon. This one is pretty simple, it will spit venom at you followed by trying to eat you. As its jaws are gearing up for a good bite you have to use the debris around you and throw it down its throat. As you do each head will retract back into the bulb until the final one falls dead. I like this boss, plant monsters have my favorite designs, but this one was pretty easy.

Level seven was Baytown, which was just San Francisco. Here we see a couple Robo-47's fighting off some UFO's before turning their attention towards my mocap suit. Ah yes, the thing that kicked off the plot. This team kept giving me the slip, I'd wail on one, the other would tag in letting his friend find all the health pick-ups. Cheeky little shits. Don't worry, I disciplined them thoroughly and moved on to the next level.

Level eight is Club Caldera, which is just Hawaii. Here we see Magmo and Agamo duking it out before they locked eyes with my singular eye painted on my mo-cap chest and decide that I was begging for a wedgie. Just like junior high. They both hit real hard, and I had to be the one who slinked away to get some health pick-ups. The whole time the UFO's start asserting their presence more, taking shots at me as I run around screaming with my underwear over my head. I somehow won against the two jocks of the roster and was able to move on.

Level nine is Tsunopolis, or just Tokyo. Here two Ultra V's backflip into the camera and challenge me to a Gundam fight, just like high school. Unfortunately I remembered the environmental trigger that causes a tsunami that will wash them away. Threw a car at a giant UFO and it created the tsunami and then I picked them off with a couple of lightning chains. With the mechs down I was abducted by the UFO and taken into space.

For level ten the UFO takes me to the Zorgulon mother ship. A citadel and base of operations orbiting between the Earth and the Moon. Here I am faced with a council of three Zorgulon, all appalled by my mo-cap suit. I tried to explain to them that my character design was impossible with practical effects and it can be fixed in post, but they weren't having it and they attacked, just like college.

There weren't many environmental hazards beyond a couple mounted turrets. Despite being in space, this level is one of the more boring ones. At least the canyon had a giant rock to throw around. Anyway, I decided the councils fate with my fists and the mother ship was evacuated. I was warped back into the saucer and as it was flying away it was hit by the ensuing explosion leading to the saucer crash landing on Earth. Thus setting up the final boss fight.

The final level is called capital. I read somewhere that it's supposed to be D.C, but it looks more like the Vatican to me. Anyway, the scene is set when the dome of the recently crashed saucer opens up revealing a brain in a four legged saucer mech. It jet boots its way out of the saucer and destroys the Washington monument before setting up a force field and beginning the battle. This is Cerebulon, the leader of the Zorgulon's and this thing can absolutely wreck my run. I remember having to start this battle over many times as a kid. There are three phases to this monster.

The saucer mech is the first one and it is invulnerable until after it does its main attack, being a laser that eats at your health like me at a sushi bar. You have to hide behind the obelisks around the pool Cerebulon is staying put in. After the laser is done Cerebulon needs to take a moment to recharge and the shield goes down. I took this opportunity to use the lighting chain to zap the brain jar. After I did that enough times the mech explodes into giant pieces and Cerebulon emerges from the wreckage in its second form, being an obvious homage to the tri-pods from war of the worlds. Also the brain can apparently twitch, which was just weird.

Anyway, this form still has a laser but will also use its tentacles to attack. The way to beat this form is to take the giant pieces of the mech suit and just yeet them at the glass brain jar in order to shatter it. After the off brand tri-pod collapses, Cerebulon decides to burst out of the dome in a scene that might be a homage to Alien. It howls and gurgles as it stands up on its tentacles and points towards me with its scythe hands to challenge me head on. Oh now the flashbacks are starting.

This is the most devastating monster in the campaign. It has a ten hit combo move that just deletes health. It does not take a break for health either, in order to heal up you have to make a run for it. If you stop moving it will just spank you over and over again until you beg for more, just like a Saturday night. I decided to just pick off its health with my light ranged attack and my beloved lightning chain. Yeah I took the cowards option here, cut me some slack! The naked dalek was after my lack of buns!

In its death throws Cerebulon's head exploded all over the square, and a smaller version emerged from that completing the Alien homage. Kineticlops declares victory, and the scene fades to black. Before the credits roll I am treated to the origin story of my chosen monster.

That was War of the Monsters. My god this thing just oozes with absolute love for the old monster movies. It is just so charming, from the music, the sound effects, all those posters above are the loading screens. The campaign itself is only a couple hours long and perfectly serviceable. The monsters having a sense of self preservation was a pleasant surprise and helped balance out the battles. The environmental hazards added some strategy to the stages when they were there. I only had issues with the camera, which was the style at the time. I absolutely recommend taking a look at this game, it's available on the PlayStation Store for the PS4. Hasn't been made available for the PS5 yet, but as I've said before the PS5 doesn't exist. If you like a good arcade brawler, and you're a fan of monsters like Godzilla, this is your game.

[argumate]

interesting aspects of the movie:

it experiments with splitscreen / comic book style shots! not a great idea tbh, kind of breaks immersion, haven't seen it used in many other movies besides Ang Lee's take on Hulk.

lots of typography, starting with the excellent opening credits which are displayed over a constellation of official printouts and documents that captures the typesetting zeitgeist of that period of line printers that predated the desktop publishing revolution.

the cylindrical underground facility resembles those that appeared in countless movies since, most notably Resident Evil, but has a much more stark and inhuman design: five layers in which your humanity is progressively stripped away as you descend, you literally have to lose the top layer of skin to reach the bottom.

hilariously silly stuff like having to desperately climb the central core of the facility to disable the nuclear (!) self destruct while being gassed and shot at by lasers designed to stop escaped test monkeys.

common trope of wise scientists confronting moronic military and craven politicians, although movie leaves open how complicit the scientists were in the germ warfare program.

secrecy is taken as a given: phone lines are cut off and civilians are told nothing even after an entire town is wiped off the map by a space virus brought back by a satellite (they plan to nuke the town).

it's 1971 so hippies make a brief appearance in the background; there's no direct mention of Vietnam, but all the helicopters and the F-4 Phantom showing up seem significant.

no direct involvement of the Soviet Union, but there is frustration when they realise they'll have to tell them before nuking Nevada thanks to the treaty banning above ground thermonuclear detonations.

it's 1971 so the old man sexually harasses the nurse and everyone smiles because that means he's getting better.

key plot point is that one of the scientists is epileptic and actually has a fit at the worst possible time, collapsing and foaming at the mouth right at the moment when people think the virus has escaped containment, oops.

the scientists take a brief moment to decry the irrational prejudice against epilepsy that would lead people to conceal it, which is a nice moment given that they're only a few minutes from nuclear obliteration at the time.

there is a man in the top secret facility whose entire job is waiting for a little bell to ring when important messages are received on the teleprinter, but it turns out that a small piece of paper is stuck in the mechanism preventing the bell from ringing, so he simply... sits there for four days and does not bother to read all the messages that are coming in as the lack of ding sound means they must not be important??

there are some advanced computer graphics in the film which like other films of the era were constructed manually with clever film editing, no computers involved.

the entire facility is run by an omnipotent computer, which is interesting as the movie is set in the present and not the future, so there is no HAL like 2001, but somehow the computer is still smarter than what you would see today (despite using 1971 era UI, which is honestly quite charming).

the facility also has the traditional calm female voice making announcements in the background (and a joke about who that voice might be) and I liked the fact that it kept making announcements that had nothing to do with the plot or characters but would be relevant to stuff happening elsewhere in the facility.

walls of fishbowl CRT screens look so ancient now oh my god.

Crichton feels like the Gladwell of fiction (if that's not already Gladwell lol) in the way that he confidently drops in pop psych stuff like the odd man rule (single men make the best decisions!) and color coding the levels of the facility for best psychological response and just random stuff like the scientists going to absurd lengths to purge themselves of bacteria to avoid contamination when the virus they're studying is already isolated in a secure chamber they're not supposed to enter.

at one point the space virus eats a guy and leaves only his polished bones behind and I think people don't make as big a deal of that as I would in that situation.

not a great movie! but definitely has its moments, and I have to admit its confidence in the coolness of its incredibly crappy computers did make me nostalgic.

The Andromeda Strain movie from 1971 is based on the book by Michael Crichton and includes some themes you might recall from Jurassic Park (life is difficult to isolate and contain, advanced technology breaks down in unexpected ways) presented in the form of a very dry scientific inquiry in which people cultivate petri dishes and take slices for electron microscopy and kill a lot of lab rats and also a monkey.

[scottymcgeesterwrites]

Final Fantasy VII Review

 Year: 1997

Original Platform: PlayStation One

Also available on: PC, PlayStation Store

Version I Played: PlayStation One

Synopsis:

The Shinra Electric Power Company rules over the city of Midgar, and the eco-terrorists AVALANCHE stop at nothing to try and prevent the life essence of the planet from being used as energy. Barrett, leader of AVALANCHE, hires a mercenary named Cloud Strife for their bombing mission on a Shinra Mako Reactor. Cloud doesn’t care much for the greater cause and only wants his pay. But then, after a mission goes awry, he meets Aerith, a flower girl who is the descendant of the Ancients. He quickly finds himself wrapped up in the greater conflict against Shinra.

 Gameplay:

Final Fanatasy VII utilizes magic spells via Materia – little orbs that come in a variety of colors pertaining to the natural elements. You can mix and match them on your weapons and equipment, which gives you access to different spells and stats. All your equipment varies with the number of slots for how many Materia orbs you can put in. Leveling up not only upgrades the character but the equipped Materia as well.

 Final Fantasy VII also uses an ATB system but is known for introducing Limit Breaks – finishing moves that build up after the character gets hit over time. Final Fantasy VI had a prototype called Desperation Attack – but it was very rare as it only appeared when your character had 1/8 of their total HP, and there was a 1 in 6 chance of performing the Desperation Attack after selecting Attack. I actually had no idea that was a thing until long after I finished the game, and never experienced it when I played Final Fantasy VI.

Graphics:

Out of all the Final Fantasy games, I have to say that this one has not aged well. It has the worst graphics of the entire series. The battle and cinematic graphics are passable.

(Most of the graphics power seemed to be put in Tifa’s, uh, bosom.)

But the characters in towns, the overworld, and in-game cutscenes are incredibly blocky. PC versions are supposedly sharper, but the PlayStation One version makes it nigh impossible to see any facial expressions. 

The graphics are definitely a product of its time. I always say that the beginning of 3D gaming was essentially like puberty – awkward and full of zits. It wasn’t yet at that stage where it could be aesthetically pleasing. We marveled about it when it was first released, yes, but then we cringed in retrospect.

The environment backdrops however are probably the strongest points, where they capture the industrial nature of Midgar, the reactors and other such buildings.

Story:

Final Fantasy VII became legendary the minute Square released it. Every aspect was memorable. Part of it could be due to the fact that it was the first Final Fantasy game to enter the 3D realm. Another part was Tetsuya Nomura’s character designs, which hit the cool meter to the point of sub-zero.

 The cinematics blew our minds. The opening action scene with Cloud, Barrett, and the rest of AVALANCHE attacking Shinra’s mako reactor is the most memorable opening to a Final Fantasy game. Period. Final Fantasy games really do know how to start at the right spot, no matter how good or bad the overall game is. The opening is always the best part.

Then there was the motorcycle chase. Cid’s airship. The gun fights. Battles with Sephiroth. The extra stuff to find, like summons and extra bosses. So much was jam-packed into the game.

 But the story was the primary factor in making VII famous. It’s definitely one of the better ones. Man, the story became so famous that even gamers who haven’t touched a Final Fantasy game knew the major spoilers. It is the equivalent to knowing Darth Vader’s line, “I am your father” without having actually watched Star Wars.

Aerith (Aeris in the English releases) Gainsborough – the innocent flower girl who holds the secrets of the Ancients – develops a romance with Cloud and fucking dies at the end of Disc 1 by the main villain – Sephiroth. The scene shocked everyone and practically made headlines. Everybody has seen the horrible image in one way or another.

It seems to me that since Final Fantasy V, the stories have gotten more and more used to main character deaths, ultimately transforming into a heavy-hitting TV series rather than simply a video game series. In other words – it matured. Looking back, Final Fantasy IV appears to be child’s play and a prototype of later dramatic storylines with fully realized worlds.

 Final Fantasy VII was also the first Final Fantasy game to create a world much like ours – one with cars and trains and airplanes and machine guns and even cellphones. The main city of Midgar reflects industrialization at its worst, with miles of slums and claustrophobic cities. Shinra Electric Power Company is a reflection of capitalism at its worst - a single entity in charge of so much that it’s pretty much the government. For the first time in a Final Fantasy game, you play as characters who dance between the morally ambiguous line of terrorism and activism. Funny enough, the theme of neglecting the planet resonates with us now more than ever. This game ended up being rather prophetic about the uncontrollable growth of corporations.

While the story is memorable with many intriguing elements, the plot itself is a tangled web. In my opinion, they really hashed in so many things that it’s easy to forget crucial details. It’s not straightforward, but at the same time everything does connect by the end. While Shinra is the driving force as a whole as the villain, Sephiroth takes over, then you learn about his backstory and then with the evil scientist Hojo and the extra-terrestrial Jenova and then “Weapon” and then the planet’s history and this and that and the other thing.

If I were to put Final Fantasy VI and Final Fantasy VII together and contrast them, as many gamers do, I would find that Final Fantasy VII is the summer blockbuster and Final Fantasy VI is the Oscar winner. Final Fantasy VII started introducing the sappy romance subplot to the series. A love triangle forms among Aerith, Cloud, and Cloud’s childhood friend Tifa. While there’s nothing inherently wrong with having a love triangle, the writing is like watching middle schoolers trying to express their feelings. Final Fantasy VI and Final Fantasy IV treated any romance with dignity and realism.

But maybe I’m being a bit harsh. After all, Cloud Strife did go through some suffering as an adolescent. His backstory clearly drives his antisocial behavior, so that becomes a good arc. 

The goofiest but memorable part of the story deals with Don Corneo and Wall Market and running around store to store doing tasks in order to free Tifa from Don Corneo. It ends with Cloud needing to cross-dress as a woman to get inside Don’s mansion. Because, you know, it’s not like Cloud can just break in with his sword and Aerith’s magic or anything like that. But whatever. It’s anime.

The recent Final Fantasy VII Remake for the PS4 seems to streamline the story, and actually enhances the emotions they were trying to deliver in the original. I will be talking about the remake in a separate post altogether since I’m almost done with it at the time of this writing. But there’s a lot that I want to say about comparing and contrasting the remake and the original.

The latter half of the plot takes a couple weird turns. At one point, Cloud became catatonic and confined to a wheelchair.

That part of the game became the sluggish part for me. Sephiroth also tries to confuse Cloud, which confused me. Cloud apparently suffers from some alternate subconscious mumbo-jumbo and like. . .ungh. I get an aneurysm thinking about it sometimes.

Complicated plotlines like Final Fantasy VII start showing up from here on out in the Final Fantasy series. The trend of bishonen characters also begin here, bishonen being the Japanese term for “beautiful boy.” Cloud and Sephiroth have that look. The series starts hashing in sappier romances and much more of an anime feel.

Final Fantasy VII ultimately marked the start of a new era for the series – introducing both cool and overused tropes.

Music:

Hands down the best Final Fantasy soundtrack of all.

The entire soundtrack of this game is memorable. The opening tune, with its light twinkle when the stars show up, is enough to make any gamer know exactly what that’s from.

With a story set in a more modern world, we have music that is more modern. After Final Fantasy VI had a more serious and operatic score, Uematsu displayed his love of progressive rock here. The motorcycle chase incorporates a lot of synth, which was fitting for zipping through the streets of Midgar. However, Final Fantasy VII is the first Final Fantasy game without that familiar starting bassline for the battle them. The battle theme is instantly recognizable but also radically different from its predecessors. It’s dramatic and displays danger.

Meanwhile, the boss theme is one of the best boss themes in the series, or any video game really. It’s an electrifying progressive rock piece, and it’s my personal favorite boss theme.

 The more instrumental pieces are somber, given the dreary atmosphere of the planet. The world map music is very different from its predecessors. It’s romantic one moment, soaring the next, and then dips into foreboding terror. I guess that sums up the story of Final Fantasy VII.

And we cannot leave out One-Winged Angel, which I will talk about below.

Notable Theme:

Without a doubt, One-Winged Angel – played during the terrifying final battle against Sephiroth – is the most memorable piece of music in Final Fantasy VII.

It may very well be the most popular song of the entire series. Nobuo Uematsu was inspired by Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring. It’s a whopping 30 something minute classical piece. If you look it up on YouTube and browse through it, you can definitely note the similarities. However, Uematsu didn’t want some boring classical introduction to the piece. He wanted to add the destructive impact of rock. The theme has a very distinct stamping-your-foot-down quality to it.

I had noticed a certain piece-by-piece feel of the song and that’s exactly how Uematsu composed it. This is the only song that Uematsu has composed where he created several tunes in his head and then rearranged them to make a single comprehensive song.

If you want to get technical, One-Winged Angel is the first Final Fantasy song with lyrics. The chorus sings in Latin about Sephiroth’s burning anger, with some lyrics actually taken from the medieval poem Carmina Burana. It sounds fantastic when fully orchestrated.

In Advent Children, the animated sequel to Final Fantasy VII, the music is accompanied by hardcore metal. This new rendition really illustrates the destructive power of Sephiroth. Uematsu changed the lyrics for Advent Children. They are more original now. I specifically noticed the lyrics “Veni, veni, mi fili”, which translates to “Come, come, my son.” Sephiroth is inviting you so he can kill you.

 Uematsu has stated that the original orchestration didn’t sit well with him. As I suspected, Advent Children’s hardcore metal version is the one he preferred, the one he would have composed had he the technology at the time of Final Fantasy VII.

Verdict:

Another must-play for any RPG fan, even if you think it’s overrated. It’s a must-play because of its popularity, in the same way that people are wide-eyed when you say you haven’t seen Star Wars or such-and-such other popular movie. It’s a whole lot of fun, especially in the scenes that involve other forms of gameplay, such as the motorcycle chase and even a battlefield strategy game in protecting Fort Condor. 

Direct Sequel?

Yes – first there was the CGI movie Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children.

I actually watched Advent Children before playing Final Fantasy VII. I had already known most of what happened in the game and Advent Children became a monumental craze when it first came out. Everybody was talking about it. Watching the sequel before playing the game skewers your interpretation of things. My first impression of Cloud was that he was always whiny and angsty, and meanwhile Tifa kept nagging him to move on. I felt really bad for Cloud losing Aerith.

Then when I actually played Final Fantasy VII, I saw that Cloud starts as this badass mercenary. Tifa is spunky and clearly is the better choice (IMO) but Cloud is enamored by Aerith after only meeting her briefly. WHAT? Cloud. Bro. Make a move on Tifa, you nitwit. Tifa is AMAZING.

 Square Enix then continued the story with Dirge of Cerberus – Final Fantasy VII. This video game sequel focuses on Vincent Valentine, a fan favorite of the original game.

Let me remind you about something – the original game revealed Shinra’s inner deep secret experiments, namely with Sephiroth and Jenova. Dirge of Cerberus introduces an even deeper research team within Shinra called Deepground. I don’t know about you, but it already sounds like the start of a terribly redundant string of sequels, like how the Jason Bourne movies keep revealing an even deeper level of conspiracy theories. Vincent’s mysterious background is now fully revealed. He is defined by – guess what? – another angsty lost lover story, this time with a woman named Lucrecia. Now, okay, look, maybe I’m just being a dick about these types of love stories. But when it keeps popping up within the same series in the same manner, I start asking if you have anything else to offer on your menu.

Lastly, there is the prequel for the PSP – Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII. Of all the games in the Compilation of Final Fantasy VII, Crisis Core has received the most positive reception. If anything, play that after playing Final Fantasy VII before bothering with anything else.

 Oh, and of course there is the Final Fantasy VII Remake, which we thought wasn’t going to happen for the longest time but they finally released it in April 2020. More on that later after I finish it, and after I post my entire series of Final Fantasy reviews!

[oriigami]

always gold (part 1)

[Okay, so, I got Roger/Rouge/Rayleigh brainrot. This is part one of what’s gonna be a three-part story for these three, based on prompts from my @op-pirate-fleet trope bingo card. Part one, mutual pining, or: three just-set-out pirates with the whole world ahead of them. Also on AO3 here!]

Gol D. Roger isn’t a complicated man. 

There are those who will disagree, of course, someday, those who will puzzle over the Pirate King’s myth for years and decades to come, piecing together a fractured legacy and wondering at the motivation behind every move. But that’s years and years away, a future still hidden behind the endless horizon.

For the moment, the Pirate King is only Roger, sitting in the bow of a sturdy little boat with his feet up on the rail and the brim of his hat shielding his eyes from the piercing sun, and he has a problem. He sighs, folds his arms and glares up at the woven brim of golden straw over his eyes, highlighted in a criss-cross pattern by the midday sunshine.

Normally, his problems don’t stay problems for long. He likes resolving things, usually quickly, usually excitingly, usually through violence. He’s not someone who leaves things waiting if he can ever help it. And he really isn’t someone who gets scared when faced with a challenge. And yet- 

“Oi, Roger!” 

Someone kicks him in the side, startling him out of his thoughtful half-asleep daze and catching him so off guard he squawks and tumbles half off of the bench, landing in an undignified pile on the deck. 

He scowls, shoves his hat out of his eyes to look up at Rayleigh, who’s leveling a perfectly unimpressed stare straight down at him. His blonde hair is mussed from the ocean winds, hanging in messy strands around his face, stiff with salt-spray, his shirt half-unbuttoned like it usually is. Roger blinks a couple times, then remembers to glare. “Hey, I was having a really nice dream.” 

“You were supposed to be keeping an eye on the horizon,” Rayleigh says. “Map says we’re supposed to reach the next one sometime today, remember?”

“So? I’m the captain, not a lookout,” he complains, pulling himself back up onto the bench with as much dignity as he can muster, which is really not much at all. 

“Then act like it,” Rayleigh says, unmoved. 

“Why can’t Rouge do it? She’s got the compass, anyways.”

“Captain has to pull his weight too,” another voice chimes in, bright with laughter, and Rayleigh steps aside to let Rouge slip past him and drop down to sit on the bench. She has her hair tied up in a bandana, cheeks a little pink from the sun, throwing her freckles into sharp relief. “Otherwise we might need to mutiny.” 

Roger opens his mouth to object, but gets distracted before he can, by- “Hey, you called me captain! Does that mean you’re joining the crew?” 

“I never said that,” she says, raising an eyebrow with a teasing smile that cuts straight through his chest. “Remember? You guys are just giving me a ride.” 

“We’ve been giving you a ride for three weeks now,” Rayleigh mutters, not sounding nearly as grumpy about it as his words suggest. 

“I never said a ride to where,” she parries back, grinning up at him as she hoists her long legs up onto the bench and leans back against Roger’s side in an overexaggerated languid stretch. Her body is warm, like the sunshine beating down on them made solid. “It’s the journey, not the destination- isn’t that what you pirates say?” 

Rayleigh snorts. “Who do you think you’re kidding? As though you’re not just as much a pirate as we are,” he says, stepping up to the rail, propping a hand on Roger’s shoulder as he leans out to squint at the horizon.

Rayleigh’s hands are strong, solid and rough from tying ropes and hauling anchors. He was a dockworker for awhile, he’s said, though he’s worked more than a dozen different jobs, apprenticed to twice as many different craftsman. His work-worn hand is heavy on Roger’s shoulder. Roger can feel it burning through his shirt. 

Rouge only grins at the accusation; Rayleigh rolls his eyes before glancing back out over the ocean, but there’s a smile on his lips. 

Rouge is warm against his side and Rayleigh’s hand is heavy on his shoulder, and Roger has a problem.

“Spyglass,” Rayleigh says, reaching his hand back expectantly without looking around, and Roger’s shoulder feels cold in its absence. 

Rouge obligingly reaches behind Roger to find the spyglass where he’d set it before drifting off, and he leans forward without really thinking so she can grab it and pass it into Rayleigh’s hand. Rayleigh brings it to his eye, propping himself up on Roger’s shoulder again, and leans forward. 

“I see it,” he says after another moment, and Roger lights up immediately, scrambling around to see for himself. Rayleigh hands over the spyglass without needing to be asked, and after a moment of searching, the island comes into view. Just a shadow on the horizon, still, but the winds are guiding them straight ahead and the ocean is calm, at least for now, as it often is in East Blue. 

They’ll be headed for somewhere bigger and better, soon, the two or three of them, depending on if Rouge comes along. 

(If she leaves, gets off on one of the stops along the line like she keeps saying she’s going to, that’s half his problem solved. He doesn’t want her to, even so.)

He grins, big and delighted, as the shadow of the distant island slowly resolves into a silhouette. There’s a blur of grey and white along the shoreline that must be a collection of buildings. This is what he lives for- new islands, new cities, new people. New challenges to be met, new fights to be fought.

The world is huge. He’s going to see it all. 

And he knows who he wants with him, when he does.

---

Roger has a by-now familiar bounce in his step as he wanders down the city streets, eyes bright and watchful in the way Rayleigh knows means he’s looking for trouble. He’s gotten used to it by now, more or less. He’s known since the day they met that Roger isn’t really someone who can be stopped from doing whatever the hell he wants. 

Rayleigh lets himself fall a step behind, partly to better take in the sights at his own pace and mostly so that when Roger inevitably does find trouble he’ll have Rayleigh at his back to haul him out of it, and finds himself side by side with Rouge. She shoots him a grin, that clever one that’s so common on her face, and slips her arm into his, falling comfortably into step.

“Beautiful city, isn’t it?” she says, tilting her head back to look up at the high, old buildings that rise above them on all sides, bricks ornately carved and engraved, the occasional gargoyle leaning down to glare at them as they pass. Past the rooftops, the sky is blue, nearly cloudless, populated only by the wheeling white shadows of seagulls.

“It is,” he has to agree, but, “I don’t like it.” 

He doesn’t even need to look over to know she’s raising an eyebrow. “Oh?”

“Everything’s too close together,” he says, glancing around. A natural consequence of the age of the city, probably; buildings built between other buildings, on top of other buildings, creating walls of architecture on all sides and few easy escape routes between them. “Harder to get away. And there’s lots of marines around, too.” 

“What, you don’t trust us to be on our best behavior?” she asks, faux-offended. He gives her a flat look, and she only manages a few seconds before breaking down giggling. 

He snorts. “You, maybe,” he allows, glancing around for the familiar yellow of Roger’s hat, but before he can find it-

“Oh, Ray, look, flowers!” she says, tugging him off to one side, pulling both his attention and him towards a cart at the side of the road, overflowing with a riot of colorful petals. Her hand is still in the crook of his arm and her voice and eyes are bright with delight, and so he follows, mostly failing to smother a smile. 

He hadn’t liked her, at first. Not that he’d disliked her, necessarily. Portgas D. Rouge was the sort of person who was deeply difficult to dislike. He just- well. If it had been up to him, he probably wouldn’t have taken her on the ship at all, this long-haired girl who called herself a traveller, who smiled almost as much as their captain did and never made promises.

But it hadn’t been up to him, and if he’s honest, he’s glad. 

Sometimes, on rare occasions, Roger has good ideas. Rouge had definitely been one of them. 

Rouge sorts through the plucked blossoms on display with gentle hands, careful with the stems and petals, and the flower-seller behind the stall looks at her with clear approval. Rayleigh will be the first to admit he doesn’t know anything at all about flowers, but watching Rouge, the clear fond familiarity in her eyes, he can’t help but think maybe he wouldn’t mind learning. 

She tucks a flower stem behind her ear, a short one with a big white starburst of petals, and whirls to look at him. “What do you think?” 

“Ah,” he says, caught slightly off guard. The flower stands out like a star against her strawberry-blonde hair, against her skin still pink from the sun. “You look- good?” 

She smiles, and she’s always smiling, but it feels like a victory anyways. “Thanks! I’m not sure if white’s my color, though,” she adds thoughtfully, pulling the flower out of her hair again and twirling it thoughtfully between her fingers. 

Rayleigh hesitates, just for a moment, then: “Red.”

He takes the flower from her hand, as gently as he can, and replaces it with another of the same type from the cart, trading snowy white petals for rich ruby red. He holds it out, feeling a little awkward. “Red’s more your color.” 

Rouge’s smile is sun-bright and radiant, and she when tucks the flower behind her ear, it suits her perfectly. 

“You two are adorable,” the flower-seller says, her weathered face creasing in a smile that wrinkles her whole face. 

Rayleigh blinks. “Oh, that’s…” he starts, then glances over at Rouge, but she just smiles at him like they’ve got a secret, the two of them, so he shrugs and drops it. 

She’s still searching her wallet for coins to pay the shopkeeper with when there’s a crash and a shout from up the street. Rayleigh looks up, already feeling resigned and disgustingly fond, and isn’t surprised even the tiniest bit when he sees Roger, laughing like an idiot and dodging around passers-by with a pair of marines on his tail, headed straight for them. There’s blood on his knuckles and running down his forehead, the same exact hue as the flower in Rouge’s hair. 

Rouge tosses a pair of coins to the shopkeep just as Roger reaches them, just as he grabs Rayleigh’s wrist in one hand and Rouge’s in the other, and then they’re running. 

The wind catches the brim of Roger’s hat and yanks it off his head, and Rayleigh reaches back almost on autopilot to grab it out of midair with his free hand and shove it back down on his captain’s stupid skull without losing a step. Roger is laughing, the sound a little uneven and jagged in his throat from the exertion of sprinting, and so is Rouge, high and clear as bells, and she has a flower behind her ear and he has blood on his forehead, and they’re the worst, both of them, and Rayleigh loves them. 

“What did you do?” he demands, more exasperated than angry, and Roger just laughs harder. 

There’s something about them, about Rouge and Roger both, something magnetic and impossible that makes it difficult to do anything but follow them. Or at least that’s how Rayleigh feels, sometimes, caught up in the orbit of two spiralling stars. Sometimes it almost feels like it’s all he can do not to get left behind.

He thinks he wouldn’t have them any other way. 

---

The sun is just beginning to set over the ocean by the time they manage to lose their pursuers and make their hasty exit from the island, the three of them in their little boat with what supplies Rayleigh had had the foresight to buy before the inevitable trouble hit. Rouge is still laughing, her chest warm from fading excitement, when they cast off. 

She reaches up to check the red lily is still tucked behind her ear, and feels something soften in her ribcage when her fingers ghost across the petals. 

She hadn’t meant to stay. Really, she hadn’t. She’d only meant to hitch a ride for an island or two, with the two boys who at once seemed like the least pirate-ish pirates she’d ever met and like they could never have been anything else. But a few days became a week became two, and she’d kept meaning to find another boat and never quite got around to it, and- well. 

She’d never planned on being a pirate, exactly, and she’s still not sure whether she is or not. But does it even matter, really, when for once she’s so happy exactly where she is?

Their little boat is, well, little. It’s only barely big enough for three people to live on full-time. They’re always in each others’ space, always sharing space. It’s almost funny, how comfortable it is, how easy. She’s barely known them for three weeks, but she already feels safer with this pair of pirates than she ever did with anyone she knew back on her home island. 

They have something in common with her, she thinks, something she’d never been able to share with anyone else back home; that tug in her soul, quiet but insistent, pulling her ever onwards towards the horizon. Is that what it is, to be a pirate?

If it is, maybe Rouge is one after all. If it is, she can’t say that she minds.

She flips the vegetables she’s frying in the pan, glances over her shoulder at her crewmates. They’re sitting side-by-side at the galley’s small table, Rayleigh surveying the only map they’ve got with a thoughtful frown, Roger leaning so close into his personal space he’s nearly on his lap. Rayleigh barely even seems to notice, only shifting his arm a little so Roger can see what he’s looking at. She can’t help but smile.

She loves them so much. 

They’ll figure it out eventually. And if they don’t, well, she’s got no qualms about just kissing the both of them and letting things sort themselves out from there. Pirates are supposed to be greedy, aren’t they? They’re supposed to take what they want, no matter what gets in their way.

If Rouge is a pirate, she must be a lucky one. 

She’s already got all the gold and silver she could want.

[roseategales]

SOLAS & ORPHEUS I: YOUR NAME IS LIKE A MELODY. (THE POWER OF EPITHETS, TITLES, & NAMES.)

                                                           EPITHETS & TITLES:

VGS: Where do you see a character like Solas ending up? Patrick Weekes: [Sighs] Musical theatre.

The above exchange is from an interview with Video Game Sophistry, where Patrick Weekes goes into detail about the creation of Solas and how we ended up with the character and romance we got. Although said in jest, I do believe Weekes honestly recognised that Solas is a character who could easily be adapted to the medium of the stage musical, due to how musicality is baked into the foundations of his story and the world of Dragon Age. In fact, Weekes compares the fantasy and romance of Solavellan to The Phantom of the Opera earlier in the interview, and anyone familiar with Phantom can see the parallels, as Solas and his arc share many tropes and archetypes in common, not just with the Phantom, but with other male characters in musicals. If I told you I was going to see a show about a Morally Conflicted Soldier, a Trickster in Disguise, a Rebel Leader, a Decadent Noble, a Mythic Legend, or a Monster Boyfriend, I’m sure several examples would jump to mind.

Solas is all of these. Layer upon layer, stitched together, and then taken apart, whenever he needs to be whatever he needs to be. And he is also, if we are borrowing the epithets from Hadestown, The King and The Poor Boy Working on a Song.

It has to be noted that Hadestown’s use of epithets is itself a nod to ancient oral poetry, particularly in the vein of Homer. In Homeric convention, important characters, settings, and objects weren’t described by adjectives, but with epithets that would change based on context. (e.g. Much-enduring Odysseus, who is another paradoxical Trickster figure in ancient myth.) The use of epithets is a signifier of the origins of Homer’s works, serving as a mnemonic device and a way to fit the scenes of the stories to dactylic hexameter, as they were first oral poems that were composed and sung in front of audiences before they were written down. However, because of our modern understanding of the English language and what the word epithet connotes to us, what Anaïs Mitchell has done by using this device in Hadestown, is turn it into something that’s closer to the definition and function of a title rather than an adjective. Hades is always “The King.” Orpheus is always “The Poor Boy Working on a Song,” or “The Poor Boy With a Gift to Give.”

Solas bears his names in a similar fashion. When introduced to us as merely Solas, he is the “Humble Apostate” (or “Unwashed Apostate Hobo,” if you have Vivienne and Dorian in your party), or the “Fade Expert”; he is nicknamed “Chuckles” by Varric and “Fade Walker” by Iron Bull. Descriptors that comment on his lowly, outsider status, beaten and betrayed in this strange new world, that endear us to him. When he again dons the badge of Fen’Harel/Dread Wolf, he is “He Who Hunts Alone,” “Lord of Tricksters,” “The Great Wolf,” “Roamer of the Beyond,” and “Bringer of Nightmares.” Bynames that, of course, evoke those given to deities in ancient cultures (e.g. Hades is also known as Plouton in Greek myth, “The Rich One.”), that make him out to be fearsome, malevolent, and unknowable beyond the legends.

When I separate Solas into these two personas and archetypes, of Solas and Fen’Harel, The King and The Poor Boy, I don’t want us to make the mistake of thinking he is someone who bifurcates himself so completely that one part of him is unrecognisable from the other. His is not a situation of one identity hiding another or two identities battling to control the fore. He is Solas and he is Fen’Harel; the way Lavellan is “The Dalish Elf” and “The Herald of Andraste.” He is simply someone who has some impressive compartmentalisation skills (displayed in a conversation he has with Sera on the tactics of the Red Jenny group), and who has a thorough experience of a line he says to Cole:

“We all have a face we want to show, and a face we do not.”

                                                                      NAMES:

Perhaps the best way to convey Solas’ complexities coming together to form the whole of him, is by examining the construction of his name. How cyclical it is, beginning and ending with the letter S, as effortlessly smooth and slippery as he. The L in the middle like a delineation, a fork in the road of choices before him. O and A on either end like they’re mirrors or masks. How it’s composed of five letters, the way iambic pentameter is composed of five syllables that you must stress and unstress—like the two syllables in his name itself. And depending on which syllable you stress in your pronunciation, your voice will either rise and fall or fall and rise when you say it.

I may be giving Gaider and Weekes too much credit here, but Solas’ name is quite literally perfect for him. Change any single one of these components or his characteristics, and you will no longer have Solas but someone else in his stead.

There are layered meanings to the sound of his name, too. Solas is a homophone for Solace and Soulless in the English language. The former recalls all the times he might’ve provided solace to his friends or lover, or received it from them; and the latter recalls how he does seemingly soulless things to achieve his goals, or becomes someone who is soulless altogether if you don’t reach out to him with kindness. Angela D. Mitchell explores this wonderfully on her blog Dumped, Drunk and Dalish, along with homonyms in other languages. Among them are:

Latin: Solus Meanings: Solitary, alone, sole, only, uninhabited.

Irish: Solas Meanings: Light, Bright, Clear; Brightness; illumination; lucid, intelligible; light-giving, lamp flame; enlightenment, insight; revelation, disclosure; the light of existence; vision. Also: self-interest; limelight.

Old Irish: Solus Meaning: Light.

Scottish Gaelic (derived from the old Irish "Solus" or "light"): Solas Meaning: Light.

Old French: Solaz, Sollas, Soulas Meanings: Joy, pleasure, enjoyment.

She also explores the Latin root of ‘Sol’:

Lone, alone, solitary, lonely, desolate, dismal, gloomy The sun (also can refer to the Sun in a personified sense) A source of comfort, calmness, soothing "To be accustomed" (as found in such words as: insolent, obsolescent, sullen)

These are all such apt descriptors for various facets of his personality and story, it shows the amount of thought and care given to him in the writing process. And of course, there are the Elven meanings: ‘Pride’ or ‘to stand tall.’

Because of the level of thought involved, I wondered how far back Gaider chose his name and decided it would mean ‘Pride’ in Elven, and how that might’ve informed Weekes’ writing of his character. @maythedreadwolftakeyou, @felassan and @lesbianarcana (my heroes!) helped me out and did some top-notch digging.

The first instance we have of the word Solas was found in a codex acquired from Dragon Age II’s Black Emporium, which was released on March 8, 2011. After that, it appears with its Elven meaning and on a map in World of Thedas Volume 1, released on April 30, 2013.

Since we have an enormous amount of foreshadowing for him by way of Shartan in Dragon Age: Origins and Merrill in Dragon Age II, I think it’s safe to say the first concepts of what Solas would mean and who the character who would wear the name would become began as far back as DAO. (Note: I believe Gaider or another Bioware dev confirmed this on social media, but I couldn’t find the post anywhere. If it crops up and you see it, please let me know. I’ll amend the post and credit you.)

In any case, the power of names is yet another running theme that links the storytelling of the ancients, Hadestown, and DA:I. Orpheus pays attention to the composition of Eurydice’s name, and remarks on how it’s “like a melody,” and his arrival in Hadestown reminds her of it when she’s been stripped of it and has forgotten who she used to be. Solas tells Abelas he hopes that he finds a new name after he leaves the guard of the Vir Abelasan, because it means Sorrow. The Qunari in Tevinter Night’s Genitivi Dies in the End have a special interest in finding out what they believe to be Solas’ “true name,” so they can then “track [him] back through the best and worst of [himself]”; “find flaws”; “exploit weaknesses”; “know what [he] failed to be.”

To be named is to be given an identity, personality, and, in most cases, personhood. To be named yourself and to be able to name others is power. Whether that comes as the name you’re privately called, your title, or your epithet.

[justgottafinishthischapter]

Worldbuilding Tips: The Five Visitors

You’ve done it. You’ve come up with an idea for your fantasy world, but right now it’s mostly curb appeal and decorations without much else. So, you have the skin and flavor of your fictional world, but what if you’re having a bit of trouble coming up with the meat needed to make your world juicy and delicious? Well, I have a little game that can help flesh out your world.

Imagine a ship or whatever other kind of vehicle arriving on the shores or outskirts of your fantasy land and from that vehicle emerges 5 people from our own mundane world: a historian, an economist, an anthropologist, a diplomat, and a cartographer. There are some other visitors, but these are going to be the most universally beneficial.

The Historian:

This person is going to be interested in the backstory of your world. They don’t need to know every minuscule detail (though they wouldn’t turn that much information down) and just a general overview would be much obliged. Many fantasy worlds such as Tolkien’s Middle Earth and Martin’s Westeros are far more rich and interesting due to the amount of effort put into crafting their world’s histories. If you’re stumped, look to real world history for inspiration. It doesn’t even need to come from the middle ages so long as it works for your story. You should be able to answer questions like: How long has the dominant civilization been around? What are the biggest defining moments in your world’s history? What things are common knowledge that every child is expected to learn (such as George Washington being the first president of the USA) and which stuff is known more by historians and social studies teachers? And as you’re discussing the rest of the visitors, think back on how the answers you give would impact the historical aspect.

The Economist:

You don’t have to know the exact cost of every single thing in your world, but have a good guess. Be able to at least have a scale of price. If someone can buy a loaf of bread for 13 of your world’s currency, but a house costs 17, that would mean that either that bread is very expensive, that house is very cheap, or each unit of your currency is equal to a lot of real world money. Whatever you use to refer to your currency, keep not only price scaling in mind, but economics. If you have a port city, there’s going to be a lot of merchants in that area. The first primary export you’re likely to see in such a port town would be seafood, but also keep in mind the things that are closet to that port, as well as the climate. Greece for instance is a very rocky and mountainous country, so while they can grow crops, they would not have been any match for medieval French Aquitaine, the crown jewel of medieval farming territory. It’s also worth remembering that food in the middle ages was far more valuable than it is today. There was an old saying that wheat is worth its weight in gold. It was southern France’s bountiful soil that caused it to become one of the richest and most coveted territories in medieval Europe.  So, keep in mind where resources would come from and where they would need to go, as well as trade that would be useful. A seaside farming town might not have any good access to raw minerals, while a city in the frozen mountainous north might not be able to grow crops, but are bountiful in minerals. The correlation of supply and demand now opens a vital trade route between them. This becomes more complex when the topic of war comes into play. The kingdom that supplies your crops and food is at war with your oldest ally. Now there’s a dilemma between having enough food to feed your people, or betraying the trust of a long time friend. Now your world building can be used as a part of your drama and narrative tension. The economy also impacts culture. What is considered a display of wealth, or is a common status symbol? What are the living conditions of the poor, the working class, the rich, and the aristocrats? Is there upward mobility? In the middle ages, you were what you were for the most part, especially serfs: peasants tied to their land. It was illegal to leave your territory, but there was a saying in the middle ages that “city air makes you free” that once a serf made it to a city, they’d be free of the life they’ve escaped.

The Anthropologist:

Every society has a culture. The way they act, think, dress, believe, talk. It’s all impacted by culture. Beliefs tend to be tied either to what has come before, or based on the world as observed. While many modern fantasy pantheons are based on ancient Greece, it’s not the only model to live by. In a loose interpretation, religion in it’s earliest stages was a rudimentary science used to explain why things happened. A culture that developed along rivers, sea coasts, and other popular trade routes are far more likely to be diverse melting pots due to the frequent traffic of people coming and going, and the common sight of foreigners choosing to set down roots. Meanwhile, a more out of the way and isolated culture is far less likely to have widespread cultural diversity. Tying back into history, a country that has experienced a number of successful wars may tend to think of themselves as invincible, or may try to police the issues of other countries, assuming they’re always on the right side, or that they can’t be defeated. The same culture may ask a high price of any other culture that asks them for militaristic support. Ask what things your people value, be they material or abstract ideals. However, try to refrain from creating a Planet of Hats, a trope often seen in Star Trek and similar Sci-Fi shows and even some Fantasy stories where everyone of a single race all have mostly the same skills, interests, personalities, and roles in the global culture. This is also the time to start thinking about myths, legends, folk heroes, and historical people and events worth celebrating, as this may be when you start to craft holidays or celebrations. This could also lead into discussing religion, and the gods or lack there of that might be celebrated by your culture. How does your society reflect itself in art, music, literature, dance. Does the way someone dresses tell you something about their place in society? Some taboos come from simple logic. The reason it’s frowned upon to eat a cow in India is the same reason it’s immoral to eat horse in western culture. Both are beast of burden livestock worth a lot more alive than dead. Cows produce milk, a source of nutrients and health. Horses are strong and were used in just about everything from plowing fields to pulling entire families or communities a great distance. Horses even became status symbols, as even in modern culture, owning a horse or pony is still considered to be (largely) a snobby rich person thing. Understanding not only what your people believe, but even just a vague idea why they would believe it is a vital aspect.

The Diplomat:

As this landing party is your fantasy world’s first contact with our own reality. How would they react to the newcomers? If there’s more than one society in your world, how would each society, country, kingdom, race, etc. react to something completely foreign? Would they try to forge an alliance? Open trade negotiations? Declare war? Prepare a feast? How would they feel about the way we dress? act? talk? How would they react to different levels of progression in technology? Could an unbiased third party from our world help two feuding sides come to peace with one another? How would they feel about knowing of a world beyond their own? Are there actions or behaviors acceptable in our own society that are considered offensive to them?

The Cartographer:

Although it’s not necessary that all fantasy worlds have a fully designed map, it is a good idea to have at least a rough idea of where things are in relation to one another. This can tell you about climate, resources, wildlife, natural borders, natural disasters, food chains, and more. It’s worth at least taking a crash course in understanding how geographical biomes tend to be laid out in order to make your world feel more real. Some authors claim that a world map is the single most important feature, others say it’s not that important. Frankly, trust your gut based on the kind of world you have. You may need a map, you may not. It really depends on the size and scope of your world. For instance, with Disney’s

Zootopia

, the entire world doesn’t matter. The audience doesn’t need to know where in the world Zootopia is, or what climate or biome it’s in. Zootopia itself is the world being built, and the separate districts and biomes of the city explain the world that’s being focused on.

Secondary Visitors:

They may still be important to your world, but are less likely to be universally helpful to all people.

Biologist: if your world has creatures beyond those found in our real world, it may be worth exploring how their bodies work on a more scientific level in order to give more realistic weight to their supernatural abilities.

Linguist/Translator: If you feel compelled to come up with a language no matter how basic or complex, it may be worth while to consider the problems with communication. this may also extend to unique idioms, colloquialisms, and slang native to your fantasy world.

Teacher/Scholar: Regardless of whether or not there is a formal education system in place in your world, a teacher may be interested in how knowledge is passed down, and what information the culture might have that would be unknown to people of our world. Whether that’s how to keep a wild animal from charging you, to knowing how to forge a mineral that exists only in your world, being able to readily answer questions is generally considered to be a good thing.

Healer: There may be healing spells in your world, there may not, but most fantasy stories tend to involve either action or adventure, both of which tend to cause fights. And since fights tend to lead to injuries, it’s important to know what can and cannot be treated, and how readily available these healing abilities are to the public.

[aion-rsa]

Why Evil is the Only TV Procedural Worth Watching

https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

This Evil article contains spoilers. You can read a spoiler-free review of the show here.

Who knows what evils lie at the heart of CBS’s Evil? Shadows know. We consulted a book of shadows (not the one Leland Townsend (Michael Emerson) skims, too many spoilers there) to cut into the left ventricle of the darkness feeding the network’s supernatural series, now in production for season 2. The blood of the police procedural pumps through the veins of the paranormal investigation show, but Evil transcends the statutes of those limitations. Occasionally by papal decree. The series is intelligent, filled with symbolism, and its main character, who is training to be a priest, drops acid on a semi-regular basis. And he’s not microdosing. Look at those baggies.

Evil doesn’t debunk demonic possession, which is the main thrust of the team’s investigations. It never treats it as campy. The series believes demons are real, even giving the audience a breakdown of the six different forms possession take. But it deliciously stops short of giving full commitment. The show also explores how to parse out personal responsibility when there’s a supernatural being to blame. In episode 7, “Vatican 3,” we learn “the court does not acknowledge demonic possession” in determining guilt or innocence. The series further muddies the waters when the crew has to take a hard look at a murder committed by someone who wasn’t possessed, such as when the parents of what they believed is a demonically possessed child kill him. The series further turns the screw because the kid they killed to save their other children was born evil. It was literally in his genes.

Evil shares DNA with The X-Files, and David Acosta, played with charisma and empathy by Mike Colter (Luke Cage), is the new show’s Fox “Spooky” Mulder. He is looking for answers beyond the veil, which has the same letters as evil, and he is putting the pieces together like a hidden map of old Manhattan. There’s a truth out there and he’s willing to do whatever it takes to understand it. He’s not in it to solve any crimes against venal sins. He is looking for deeper meaning, and this alone puts the series above most procedurals. David’s got a bit of the scientist Dodge from original The Planet of the Apes film in his cinematic character. One of the first astronauts to delve so deep into the outer reaches of space, “He’d walk naked into a live volcano if he thought he could learn something no other man knew.” David is the same. He was a foreign correspondent in war-ravaged Afghanistan who got to know the soldiers whose stories he reported. Truth and knowledge are the most noble of callings, and ultimately come before his religious calling.

While the basic premise of a spiritual believer teamed with a dissenting psychologist is procedural trope, Evil is out to debunk the law of its diminishing returns. First, the show teams David with not just one skeptical voice, but two. Katja Herbers’ Dr. Kristen Bouchard plays the same role Agent Dana Scully played to Mulder, and with a similar arsenal. She comes from a different perspective, though. Bouchard does indeed believe in miracles, but thinks they all have scientific explanations. She is confident the only reason something might defy natural principles is because science hasn’t been applied properly yet. Scully, who wore a cross and took her faith seriously, accepted miracles on faith. David and Kristen rarely come to the same conclusion.

Ben Shakir, played by Aasif Mandvi, brings common knowledge, and shades his skepticism with cynicism. The former Daily Show correspondent takes on the weight of all three Lone Gunmen but with more constructive skills. Before joining the paranormal team, he was a carpenter, just like Jesus. Ben knows how things work, and when everyday mechanisms like sinks or faulty wiring are the root cause of supernatural phenomena, he can turn the screws, and spot the mold. Ben, “the Magnificent,” as Kristen’s children call him, is also tech savvy, and quite capable of hacking hackers.

Evil also throws things at Ben which he can’t easily spackle over with even the best of tests. Try as he may, and he tries, he can’t explain the light of an angel in the frame of a surveillance video. There is no evidence of doctoring, even at the most expert levels. “The world is weird,” David passes off as dating advice when Ben asks about potential girlfriend Vanessa (Nicole Shalhoub), who wants to know she if she should detach from her dead sister before committing to a new relationship. Vanessa thinks she is “tethered” to her phantom sister by the right arm.

Supernatural science is bizarre, creators Robert and Michelle King (The Good Wife, Braindead) believe. They push the show to diagnose causes the external evidence of exorcisms and stigmata, the bleeding wounds which correspond to the wounds on Christ’s hands when he was nailed to the cross. Because stigmatics display their wounds as they are portrayed artistically, rather than how the Romans historically would have done the crucifixion, it proves it comes from a psychological source. Internal belief causes the phenomena, not external spiritual forces. Evil explains that, allowing ample room for skepticism, belief, and even poetic reasons for spiritual incursions. David quotes Shakespeare to enunciate his faith. The concept of free will doesn’t come up in most procedurals. Neither does the way sociopolitical issues are turned into supernatural questions and tied to the origins of evil.

Evil is almost a character in Evil, and has relatable entry points. Real demons first get to Kristen’s four young daughters through an augmented reality videogame. A little girl who never takes off her Halloween mask almost gets the sisters to bury one alive. We don’t know how much of the characters’ perceptions is the result of a demon character’s influence on them. Each character is slowly being tempted by the dark side.

Kristen joined the team as a rational thinker but has had to accommodate uncomfortable ideas and adjust her comfort zone accordingly. In her usual line of work, she’s analyzed the criminally insane, but the show has pushed her into close contact with people who are evil in the Biblical sense. She is being pushed incrementally by forces in and out of her control. Her own mother Sheryl (Christine Lahti) sides with a manipulative competitor, Leland, over her daughter, and he’s made direct threats. The first season can be seen as Kristen’s slow corruption. The second season may see Kirsten apply her skills to her own situation, which will delve further into the dichotomy between the spiritual and pragmatic.

This is because Kristen may have already fallen. The final episode includes a telltale blood stain, which she wills Ben to unsee. On any procedural this is considered a clue, but here on Evil, the evidence actually points further than a mere homicide. It is the first sign that a main character has gone to the dark side. It is confirmed when the touch of a crucifix blisters her hand. There’s no such thing as an original sin and Kristen has been flirting with temptation long before this.

Kristen is a married nonpracticing Catholic who lost her faith. She’s sexually attracted to David, a man on his way to becoming a priest. When this subject was broached on the classic 1970s cop comedy Barney Miller, a prostitute who was supposed to be a young priest’s last fling before he entered a monastery said “I break laws, not commandments.” It feels like Kristen reminds herself of this every time the two of them are on screen alone together. Their sexual chemistry is that palpable. Yes, this is very similar to the long-gesticulating romance between Mulder and Scully, but he was no priest and she wasn’t married. Not only is Kristen married, but she’s got half a brood of daughters. Annoying things, really, but at least one of them has an excuse. Another reason Evil is the only procedural worth watching is because everyone on it just might be cursed. That’s not found in the manuals.

Evil towers over contemporary procedurals in how it’s going dark. Most procedurals chase a morally compromised arc, but Evil treats it like an encroaching corruption. Kristen, who is sworn to uphold the law, may have gone more than rogue vigilante. Besides the crucifix-burning season closing, David has visions of a goat demon waiting for Kristen with a scythe. She’d been tormented by her own personal demon throughout the season but when the George, the demon-like creature who visits Kristen during sleep paralysis, falls on the knife, it changes nothing. He is just one of many demons. One of them set up practice and is taking office hours with Leland.

The Demon Therapist is an all-male Goat of Mendes, or Baphomet. The show gets into how different biblical angels look from how they’re perceived artistically and by the contemporary faithful, but won’t present a faithful representation of Baphomet. It’s as patriarchal as Chilling Adventures of Sabrina. Evil keeps it vague whether the goat demon is real or in Leland’s head. The Demon therapist appears in Kristen’s dreams as well. Lexis (Maddy Crocco) disabled the house alarm for the visiting devil therapist when he invites her to “the next level,” making it seem she is at least susceptible to underworldly influence. The kids are irritating, but they are a bargaining chip and their father, Adam, put them up for grabs when they chanted together offering an exchange of souls. Kristen was co-opted into evil through protective motherly instinct. She doesn’t see the mark of the devil as a badge of honor. When Kristen puts the cross in her palm, she doesn’t look like she expected it as much as feared it.

While the network show will never have the freedoms afforded cable series, the acting is top notch all around. Series like HBO’s Perry Mason or even Showtime’s reimagined second incarnation of Penny Dreadful: City of Angels, provide a wider range of emotion and carnality. But Evil gives us muted, for the most part believable performances, very often underplayed. As are the special effects and use of technology as a narrative device. Too many procedurals treat high tech surveillance and other investigative tools like they are all-seeing eyes which can count nostril hairs.  It has become normalized. Evil doesn’t waste intellectual space with unreasonable gadgets. The tools Ben or Leland use to their computerized ends are believable. At one point, Kristen asks Ben to record a cell phone conversation which is already halfway over. She is surprised he can’t with all his special skills.

The series incorporates real world horrors into mundane life. Even some of the most normal looking settings carry a sense of unease, to underscore the show’s thesis that the supernatural is natural but never quite normalized. Many of the scenes are shot vertically, drawing the viewers’ eyes upward and inferring something is always going on above. The series’ many wide-angle shots put a distance between characters even in close-ups.

The show isn’t afraid to wear its influences on its sleeves, and on several occasions has a lot of fun with it. For Dr. Kurt Boggs’ (Kurt Fuller) arrival at an exorcism, they recreated Father Merrin’s introductory scene in the horror classic The Exorcist, shot for shot, even getting an exact replica of the light post and the same make car, though different year, from the film. They gave nods to Rosemary’s Baby, Misery, Cabin in the Woods, and Children of the Corn.  The climbing ax which Kirsten grabs on her way out to do damage on the serial killer Orson looks like it has teeth. As did the walking stick Lon Chaney’s Larry Talbot carried in The Wolfman. The demon George looks like Freddy Krueger’s good-looking cousin. The tonality of the show is reminiscent of Charles Laughton’s immeasurably influential Night of the Hunter.

The main reason Evil shines above most procedurals is because it is scary, and those scares have been building slowly and deliberately. Commonplace settings feel off, and the world around is filled with conspiracies and coverup. The Vatican asks the team to determine whether a woman who knows the hidden history of the church is a false prophet. The fertility clinic Kristen and her husband Andy used when conceiving Lexis corrupts fetuses with satanic insemination. A witty but innocuous internet meme, Puddy’s Christmas song, is a hummably foreboding earworm. Anything can go evil on Evil.

cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });

Evil season 2 is currently in production. Read more about that here.

The post Why Evil is the Only TV Procedural Worth Watching appeared first on Den of Geek.

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[miloscat]

[Review] Shantae & The Pirate’s Curse (3DS)

The third full Shantae game takes things in a slightly different direction. Does it work? Yes!

For story reasons, Shantae has lost her magic, and so replacing transformation dances in this game are the pirate-themed weapons and tools of former antagonist Risky Boots. I applaud the commitment to continuity, but also the abilities passively granted by these milestone tools are... actually more fun to employ than stopping to transform when necessary. Leaping and climbing as a monkey was fab, don’t get me wrong, but late in this game you get the ability to quadruple-jump and that’s just amazing.

Pirate’s Curse heavily reuses sprite assets from Risky’s Revenge but expands the scope into a true full-scale adventure (it also brings back and updates enemies from the GBC game to this more modern, expressive pixel art style). The structure is more like Monster World IV this time (a game I consider a spiritual predecessor to the Shantae series), in that there are discrete semi-open “levels”, but you can and must return to them later on with your expanded abilities for completion.

The story neatly employs the trope of “goodie and baddie team up to fight bigger baddie”, and does nice things with the side characters too, including an especially touching sequence with Shantae’s zombie friend Rottytops. There’s some new faces too who fit in well; this time, the character portraits for dialogue were actually handled by Inti Creates. I’d say certain situations and designs lean even further towards sexualising the female characters, to an almost uncomfortable degree... but they do try to balance it with cheesiness/cartooniness and there’s a good range of positive character traits or character development. I have mixed feelings.

Either way, as far as the game is concerned I consider it a high watermark for the series, for reasons including—but not limited to—the gameplay feel and humorous writing. I had tremendous fun exploring the diverse island locations, and expanding my movement/combat/puzzle solving options as the game went on. Special mention too to Jake Kaufman’s jazzy soundtrack, always a high point.

I played on 3DS, which is an excellent platform for showcasing the sprite art, as well as providing a second screen for constant map or inventory display. The “New” model’s extra buttons (or the Circle Pad Pro) were also used well to navigate those screens. As a final note, there were a ton of back-references and story links to the two previous games, so it was very rewarding to have revisited them before playing this, and I recommend at least playing Risky’s Revenge in conjunction with Pirate’s Curse.

[an-tig-on-ie]

Say hello to my new Earth Defense Force 5 Review!

Once it keeps lots of the recognizable tropes in the franchise--four player classes, a massive assortment of assignments, unlockable weapons and things, and obscenely dreadful in-game dialog that is so bad it is great --EDF 5 ratchets up everything to 11 and unexpectedly pulls off it. With bullet-hell design action and enormous, open battlefields where each building is destructible, it seems like there is no better time to get out there and rescue the planet from rampaging space pests as well as their alien masters.

As you emerge from the subterranean foundation the scale of this assault becomes evident, with you finally joining the EDF and climbing through the ranks to eventually become Earth's greatest hope for success. It is a pleasure, if average, assumption that performs throughout the cheesiest in-game dialog I have ever heard. It requires numerous difficult ends, culminating in one of the most eccentric and adventuresome boss fights conceivable. Seeing the narrative weave as it attempts to link the dots is like watching a slow motion trainwreck you can't take your eyes off from--it is so brash and absurd you can not help be it. Although the dialogue and narrative could have you gritting your teeth in the degree of cringe, the activity is something different completely.

Before getting out on the battle, you are given a selection of playing through every assignment with one of four different personality types, each with distinct play styles and their particular loadouts. The Ranger is your stock standard soldier kind and by far the simplest to use in direct battle, although the Wing Diver is quickly, great for close combat, and may fly herself from harmful conditions. As it's possible to play any assignments as any participant type, some decisions certainly made for a simpler time than many others. Selecting an Air Raidera personality who will ask long-lived cannon fire and automobile drops, for a undercover assignment is not the best use of its own abilities. However, the game will enable you to do it anyhow, thankfully allowing you to examine things out and work it out on your own. Loading times are fast, so in the event that you make a bad selection of loadout, it is only a fast jump back into the menu to alter this up prior to getting back on the market.

Assessing the alien hordes could be a totally overwhelming experience. The scale of what's imposing, particularly when confronted with a swarm of very mad bugs which are clawing and climbing not only themselves but flat buildings, factories, and houses to get in you. Calling at a bombing operate as a Air Raider will zoom out the camera to demonstrate a wide shot of the region, together with the sky lighting bright orange because the bombs rug the landing zone. Numerous vehicles such as tanks and armored suits could be predicted in or discovered scattered round, and though they can feel quite loose and unwieldy in the best of timesthey are a fantastic way to go from 1 side of this map into another or to put some distance between the horde.

Player movement also feels somewhat cluttered. Moving from a normal run to a dashboard feels more awkward than it needs to, as does overall running about. Happily, aiming feels tight and indestructible, therefore no matter if you are in tight distance or outside on a hill overlooking a wide-open beachside, battle always feels much more rewarding than not.

Replayability is invited through conflict. While the health pickups cure both you and your local AI allies--that you may figure out from the battle and amuse under your oversight --armor and weapon pickups both attest after the assignment is finished, providing you with access to new and updated weaponry and a greater foundation HP variety respectively. The difficulty level you perform will also affect your wages, with greater problems giving you more powerful weapons with greater base stats, inviting you to return to a higher difficulty level to grind better equipment.

Although offline and online campaign advancement is split, which means you will want to play the assignments twice to unlock and get them in every, blasting through aliens along with other people chooses the core gameplay to another level. My co-op spouse could not hit me to revive me instead resorted to destroying the tower, so bringing me down onto it I could subsequently be revived. Likewise a guided missile weapon that they had been using as a Ranger took on a completely new degree of lethality when coupled with my laser sight to direct them, raising its scope far beyond its usual capacity. Classes are balanced in order that they could helpfully support each other in special ways, which you just don't get in the single-player style where everything is placed directly onto your shoulders.

For all that is happening on display, together with bullets, missiles, debris and bodies flying every which way, you may anticipate EDF 5 to encounter framework drops sometimes. But once did operation slow to creep through a particularly busy scene between a mothership, a crumbling town, countless enemies and a rainstorm. A number of those grimier textures and character models provide it a dated appearance, though while it is not the best-looking match round, it's the headroom to deal with the sheer quantity of stuff happening around you with no severe performance hits when the action gets out of control.

Its enormous conflicts are a joy to watch play both from close and afar, along with the vast array of weapons and drama styles with every participant kind features lots of reason to return for more after the last bullet was fired.

[toneysaltau8957-blog]

Microsoft Azure Cloud Gaming Tutorial 2018 Flickstiq

As befitting the blog of a broadsheet newspaper, the Guardian's Games Weblog eschews the scramble for press releases and screenshots in favour of a far more measured approach, providing analysis, interviews and opinion. Often readable, and usually thought-provoking. The God of War series has, until now, stuck really close to the standards set in the original 2005 game. Much more than a decade (and numerous games) later, it makes sense that Sony would want to mix items up for the aged hack-and-slash series. Like so numerous well-known franchises that have reinvented themselves in recent years, the new God of War dips into the effectively of open-world RPG tropes. It also shifts its focus to Norse mythology, casting off the iconic Greek gods and legends that offered the basis for every single preceding game. When it comes to portraying mental illness, Hellblade requires a sympathetic approach and is not at all interested in displaying the differences among reality and imagination. It really is all about Senua's perspective with her visions and what is genuinely actual getting presented as 1 in the exact same. One of the far more oppressive aspects of her psychosis are the inner-voices, who quarrel with one particular an additional even though commenting on the wandering warrior's present state. Using binaural audio-which tends to make wearing headphones a have to for the complete impact-you will get to experience a taste of what it really is like to have numerous voices in your head. Makers have released new models to replace the 2017 ones. In basic, the new models come with reduced input lag and faster response time and accept numerous input signals, which is superb for gaming. A lot more models contain exciting gaming characteristics like Variable Refresh Rate, optional Motion Interpolation with low input lag, or optional Black Frame Insertion. But there are so several a lot more easy, experiential joys to be found in Far Cry download gta 5 for android tablet. The exhilarating feel of jumping off a mountain and flying through the skies in a wingsuit. The idle chit-chat in between your Specialists. Fishing in 1 of the several rivers or lakes for hours on end. Petting your animal companions. Flying a plane for the initial time in the series. The taut and precise gunplay. The relaxing feeling of cruising down a picturesque highway in a 70s muscle car, listening to the wonderful selection of classic American (and one particular Australian) rock and country tunes on the radio. If you like to gamble, there's also the choice for Arcade Hero, a version where you can opt to play new and reasonably unplayed maps. It's evident that there are not a lot of individuals prepared to try out multiplayer maps in this fashion because I wasn't able to uncover a match in Arcade Hero, but I encountered some intriguing tips in the single player version. You're awarded bonus expertise towards your Far Cry Arcade progression if you participate in Arcade Hero modes, and levelling this up will reward you with in-game currency and Perk Points, which you can bring over to the campaign. United Kingdom About Blog TheSixthAxis offers European Gaming News and Opinion. Designed in 2007 to concentrate on the PlayStation three, the web site has expanded to cover all key platforms. Its mission is to offer the most up-to-date previews, reviews, news, and gossip in TSA's personal inimitable style, and to cater for our superb and nob-totally free community. For the most part, puzzles revolve around unlocking doors by locating glyphs hidden in plain sight or in alternate perspectives that need manipulating Senua's focus, illustrating her abstract interest to detail. While these puzzles can be clever, the exact same style happens far also typically, producing some of the much more drawn out sequences a chore. On the inverse, the moments exactly where Senua is stripped of her senses and gear, forcing her to take a more subdued method to steer clear of her enemies, felt far much more engaging and exciting.

[tbtntrauma2550]

Engaging with Trauma Individually and Through Art from the 1960’s - Early 2000’s

By Bianca Barton

Consciousness-raising Groups

In the 1960’s, conceptions of feminist-informed trauma recovery was built on the idea that personal is political (Evans 269). TBTN not only exposed sexual violence to the public realm, but reshaped what could or could not be considered trauma - previously of which was understood to be war-related or “outside the range of human experience,” thus disregarding sexual, physical, or emotional abuse (Mohamed 2). Additionally, the theory of feminst therapy emerged from the heightened awareness of the violence patriarchy perpetuated, as well as the discussions between women in consciousness-raising groups, where “the energy and emotional fuel for the movement came out of women’s personal experiences'' (Evans 273). Consciousness-raising groups were key in coalescing the connection between individual progress and the social change that was pushed by the large scale TBTN movement, and consequently, encouraging feminists to articulate their understandings of their trauma in a setting that was free from the brutally stereotyped psychological methods used in therapy from the 1960’s. Furthermore, while TBTN contributed to perpetuating racial stereotypes, consciousness-raising meetings sought to include the consciousness of Black women in feminism as they were excluded from the “second wave.” Considering the intersection of race with gender became an essential part to the “core of feminist therapy, with its emphasis on the vision of therapy as an act of political resistance” (Evans 275) that later started to unfold at the end of the 20th century.

Art Making: Zines as Sites of Healing and Information

In order to perform the individual side of healing, many feminists turned to art and writing to “exemplify the connections between personal narratives and political action” (Davidson 97) and heal themselves on an individual level to in turn contribute to social change. For example, consistent marches and political activity on behalf of TBTN organizations occured in the 1980’s alongside the explosion of “zine culture”, that allowed marginalized female creators the liberty to control their own commodities and expressions without the restraint of mainstream censoring or publishing difficulties. In a curation and analysis of over seventy zines, feminist sociologist Dr. Tonya Davidson compiled accounts of violence and individual perspectives young women had on their traumas in relation to TBTN. In a zine titled Can u See Yrself? from the turn of the twenty-first century, anonymous zine contributor referred to as “Allyson” writes about a TBTN protest that occurred on the campus of York University, like many zine artists who mapped the events of TBTN marches;

“So this party of 11 marches around campus, and I’m shouting and carrying on. Hoping that someone I know sees me…we took over parkdale, we took back the streets-for one night. One street, for an hour- but that’s something. If all it did was fill hundreds of wimyn with pride and a feeling of sisterhood that was enough” (Davidson 98).

Red Alert was a zine released in the mid-1990’s that centered on women’s reproductive and sexual experiences. Davidson found a list of question accompanied with an anonymous confession from the writer, “I’m a girl and I’m a sexual abuse survivor. I came up with these questions as part of a healing process for me dealing with being abused by boys, but also cuz I really think a helluva lot more boys need to be thinking more about their sexual relationships with women'' (Davidson 97). The author displays deep awareness of the dissonance between her identity as a sexual abuse survivor, alternatively a trauma victim, and the lack of accountability society had and continues to have towards perpetuators. She takes ownership of her healing process as well as directing her qualms with patriarchy into public question.

Additionally, zines served as sources of information, such as instructions for recognizing abuse, reporting rape, resources to contact, or transition housing. Not only were they mediums of self expressions, but zines were utilized as forms to organize and compile trauma histories in multifaceted manners.

Art Making: Poetry and Literature at the Intersection of Rape and Trauma

Aside from zines, poetry and literature surged as another form of weaving trauma into conceptions of patriarchy and rape victim criminalization, such as Adrienne Rich’s “Rape” from Diving into the Wreck, Poems from 1971-1972. Rich’s poem speaker details an intense and horrific scene between a rape victim and a police officer she is reporting to, knowing that rape was rarely recognized as a crime in the 1970’s. The articulation of the survivor’s story and interiority was one way rape was reconfigured as a horrific act and one that could be damaging to life and one’s psyche that placed in closer to the realm of unimaginable human horror that is trauma.

It is essential to acknowledge that prior to and during the decade of the 1970’s, the National Center for PTSD claimed that “rape was thought of as a rare event, incest as a culturally universal taboo” (Harvey and Herman 1). However, a series of studies at the The Cambridge Hospital Victims of Violence Program that surveyed community and individual samples of adult women concluded that “the data suggest that rape is a familiar experience in the lives of women and girls” (Harvey and Herman 2). Thus, “feminist authors have interpreted rape and incest not as rare and isolated events, but as com­monplace risks in a culture conducive to sexual violence” (Harvey and Herman 2). Establishing statistics and conclusions about the prevalence of rape aided trauma studies in forming an understanding of rape as a factor that was intrinsically weaved through the experiences of women, and even more disturbingly, the juxtaposition of women of color that were susceptible to further violence that remained unseen during their exclusion from second wave feminism.

Before Rich’s publication of Diving into the Wreck, Poems, prolific author Toni Morrison published her first novel The Bluest Eye. It tells the story of Pecola as she struggles with her position as a young Black girl and with rape and incest from the perspective of her foster sister through flashback. The novel focuses on “transforming traumatic memories in narrative ones” which Morrison shows how “this therapeutic process becomes also a movement of resistance, as it rescues erased histories and brings [voices] to public consciousness” (Gomes 108). This piece of literature is an intersecting point of race, voice preservation, rape, and ultimately grappling with trauma on individual level for the greater purpose of public conception.

Conclusion

Art creation is a personal method of coping and the aforementioned examples engage with trauma on a smaller scale, though still within the context of the relationship between trauma and feminism. Consciousness-raising groups were grassroot and investigated trauma in various ways outside of the typical hierarchy traditional mental treatments instilled between patient and client. Art was and continues to be a window into “viewing clients in the context of their lived experience” that remains “consistent with the practice of” (Evans 270) what has been defined as feminist-inflenced therapy. Furthermore, feminists developing space within art directly combats the unspeakable trauma trope as well as the cultural silencing that feminists have historically navigated.

[scottymcgeesterwrites]

Final Fantasy Review

Year: 1987 Original Platform: Famicom Also available on: Nintendo (NES), GameBoy Advance (Final Fantasy I & II: Dawn of Souls), PlayStation One (Final Fantasy Origins), PSP (Anniversary Edition) Version I played: PSP

Synopsis:

The world is in danger. Four monstrous fiends, each corresponding to an element of nature, have wreaked havoc on the world, causing each of the four elemental orbs (in later remakes, crystals) to turn dark. Four Heroes of Light, each holding their own orb, meet and band together to take on these fiends and restore nature to its proper balance.

Gameplay: The original game introduced the Job System. The six jobs are Warrior, Thief, Monk, Black Mage, White Mage, and Red Mage. Each have their own stats. You are free to name each of your heroes. Later on the game, each job can be upgraded.

We are introduced to a classic setup of turn-based combat. Final Fantasy was notable for being the first video game RPG to show your characters on the right and the enemies on the left; all previous video game RPGs had a first-person view with the enemy directly in front of you.You choose your action between Fight, Magic, Drink, Item or Run. Then the enemy takes their turn.

It’s a simple system that at the time was already well-known. It was really the Job System that intrigued players. Black Mages perform destructive magic, White Mages heal and restore, Warriors are the powerhouses, Monks deal damage without weapons, and Thieves can run from battles successfully (they cannot steal, as later games would introduce that). The game can be quite difficult on the original Famicom and NES. It was made at a time when technology was limited, so developers had to make the game harder so that people spent more time playing it. There’s a gaming term that I’ll be using in many of these Final Fantasy reviews called “grinding”. Grinding is when you end up having to run around and fight monsters for the sake of leveling up your characters. There is a lot of that in this game, as well as the early Final Fantasy games in general. Unlike games today, the direction isn’t fully laid out. You are thrown into the world and wander about from town to town to figure out where to go next. Instead of games like today where other non-playable characters (NPCs for short) tell you what to do in cutscenes and whatever, you actually have to approach the NPCs and find out the information. The overall effect is more open-world. You walk across fields and oceans and deserts. There are caves and other secret places to find more items. From a modern gamer’s perspective, the exploring can be quite bare and – for lack of better word – boring. The remakes, like the PSP version that I played, brightened it up with updated graphics. They also added a couple extra dungeons. I actually spent time in those extra dungeons believing they were part of the story, appalled by how difficult they were, when I later found out they were extras put in for the PSP version. That has happened a lot to me with remakes of old RPGs (Chrono Trigger for the DS, another example). A little more obvious sign would have helped to make me realize that I didn’t need to finish those extra dungeons. The pace is definitely slower than the other Final Fantasy games. Most of your time is spent grinding. Grinding can sometimes be a wary word when talking about video game RPGs. If an RPG is too boring or tedious, grinding is the last thing you want to hear. But even when an RPG is fun, grinding means that you need to spend time battling enemies, and that means hopefully you don’t have a huge backlog of other video games. It's probably why I never got around to finishing the original NES version on an emulator. Once and a while I'd be pumped up about going through with it but then as I played I just. . .got distracted by other video games that I wanted to finish.

You definitely need time and patience. The most aggravating thing about the original version (Famicom/NES) is that if your character is set to attack an enemy but another one of your characters defeats it first, that character attacks nothing but air when it's their turn. It was a very annoying issue that they fixed in all subsequent remakes. When comparing the original to any other version, the original always is the best way to experience the game. It can also be the hardest and most time-consuming. You would need to pay attention to this game entirely and not be distracted by anything else.

The PSP version is watered down. I found it infinitely easier than the NES version. I actually played them side-by-side to figure out at what point the difficulty branched off. Right away when you venture to save Princess Sara, I realized that the PSP version gives more XP per battle than the NES version. Hence, you have to grind more in the original version.

Graphics:

Everybody loves some 8-bits, but let’s be honest here – there’s a whole lot of black empty space going on when you battle.

But hey, that was due to the limitations at the time. Battles may seem more boring to you due to the lack of detail to catch your eye.

The later remakes added a floor or ground where appropriate. The PSP remake did a good job of giving a facelift to the original, as shown below. It has this cute, rounded feel to the characters.

(My favorite battle background was in the final battle.)

The opening FMV sequence is ripped straight from the Playstation One remake. That didn’t age well. It’s awkward as hell. Want to see how awkward it looks? It looks mad awkward. Don’t say I didn’t warn you. Just look it up. I don’t want to sully this post by posting a screenshot. In my opinion, they should have created a brand new opening FMV sequence for the PSP version.

Story: The first several minutes of the game acts as a prologue. The Four Heroes of Light save a princess - Sara - from the clutches of Garland, and then the King of Coneria allows a bridge to be built for them to enter the world and save it. It’s not until that bridge is built that the game truly starts and the title screen actually displays – much like a late opening title in a movie. In retrospect, saving a princess probably seemed like the most common trope in video games throughout the '80's. Gamers would have been used to it by then. That short prologue acts like a trope-breaker. The average gamer would have probably expected the game to be like Mario or Zelda. Oh yeah, save the princess from some evil fiend, okay, got it. They would have then maybe been perked with interest when they "defeated" Garland so quickly, and then when the King of Coneria lets them pass into the world and the title screen opens up with the theme song, they maybe were like, "Ooooh. NOW it starts." Final Fantasy then plunged them into a wide open world.

The bulk of the story is mostly comprised of self-contained incidents. You run into someone who needs help with a thing so you do that thing and then you’re on your merry way again. You know what would be a great adaptation of this game? A Netflix series. It’s very episodic. First you deal with these pirates led by Bikke, then get a ship to sail across the land and go on a sort of delivery quest for a crown, a crystal eye, an herb, a magic key, until the main story picks up with defeating the Four Fiends and bringing light to the darkened orbs. There's no real huge spoiler other than the time travel paradox at the end, which had me wracking my head a bit. It's quite admirable that a game this early in video game console history produced a higher concept plot involving time travel. Music:

Composer Nobuo Uematsu created a legendary score that immediately became on par with the Mario and Zelda theme songs.  The Prelude/Crystal theme – the harp-like scale that we are all familiar with – was actually composed last. Uematsu had complete the score when Sakaguchi approached him at the last minute realizing they needed music for the game’s introduction. None of them had any idea that the theme would become a staple for Final Fantasy.

Due to the technical limitations at the time, you can imagine that the soundtrack is limited, but even so it was still quite expansive for its time. There are several individual tunes for dungeons, for sailing your ship and for flying your airship. The map theme will have you humming it without realizing it.

Uematsu drew his inspiration from two sources – classic rock and living in Shikoku, an island off Japan. The melodic world map theme in Final Fantasy (and the rest of the series) derives from the picturesque memories he has of the island. The town theme is reminiscent of the sleepy villages – as he was never a city person. Meanwhile, the battle theme has undertones of rock music.

There’s only one battle theme, even when fighting bosses and the final boss, but the amazing thing is that it never gets old.

Final Fantasy games are known for their great battle songs. The opening bassline always gets you in the groove to fight. You’re fighting but want to sing at the same time. Maybe that’s the brilliance of Uematsu; because of the fact that you need to grind many times in these old Final Fantasy games, he created a tune that you wouldn’t get tired of because it’s not so serious or mundane.

Not to crap on other great developers, but other video game RPGs at the time of Final Fantasy didn’t quite have memorable battle music. Just look up the battle theme to the first Dragon Quest game (released before Final Fantasy). You can imagine how that simple tune could get old really quick. I could be pulling this out of my ass, but after Final Fantasy, it seemed that battle music in video game RPGs suddenly got better. If you listen to the Dragon Quest IV battle theme, there is a portion that sounds similar to the battle theme of Final Fantasy.

The PSP version adds more tracks, specifically to the boss battles, and I like how they incorporate the original battle motif thrown into the new battle songs. The original battle theme has a guitar and drums added, which is the style that Final Fantasy battle music was known for by then.

There is one last thing to note about the score that I found very interesting for its day and age. You see, in a movie score, you have themes and motifs, just like a video game score. But in a movie score, other tracks reference those themes and motifs. For example, you have The Raider’s March in the Indiana Jones films; that’s the theme for the character Indiana Jones. Then in the movie, whenever Indy does something badass, you hear his theme blare in that instance. Obviously the entire theme doesn’t play, but it is incorporated in snippets throughout.

Uematsu actually does this with the Town Theme. He incorporates it at the ending music in the epilogue. It took me a while to try to understand why. Then it hit me. The epilogue mentions the heroes becoming legends as people talk about them. Legends are told and spread in towns.

It’s a very small detail. It’s such a small detail that it could be nothing but if it is what I think it is, then it’s cool that he was already in the mindset of passing on themes and motifs throughout the game, treating it like a movie.

Notable Theme:

I already posted the main themes in the introduction, but here’s the original battle theme:

Verdict:

A strong debut to the Final Fantasy series. To a modern gamer though, you may be spoiled by the fast-paced, eye-catching video games of today. When console games first hit the market, developers had to create games that took longer than the average arcade game to finish, or else kids would get bored with their games in minutes and gee, wouldn’t that be a waste since they paid way more than a quarter? Thus, that’s another reason why old games are harder. Given the technical limitations at the time, developers couldn’t expand much on the game, so there’s a lot of leveling up and grinding because what else could you do? You know? Ultimately, playing a video game back then was all about honing your skill with that game.

Ideally, you could play through every Final Fantasy game in order of their release, and that would give you a greater sense of the evolution of the gameplay and the series as a whole. However, most people reading this (and me) are probably more modern gamers – and as such, our perspective is biased on what feels “exciting” and “remarkable”. The first Final Fantasy game could feel boring and tedious to you now, but if you put it in the context of when it was made, this was entertainment for hours on end. This is basically like watching one of those silent adventure films starring Douglas Fairbanks. Yeah, you’ve been spoiled with more amazing stuff like The Matrix and Star Wars, but golly – this stuff blew people’s minds back in the day.

Direct Sequel? No. However, there have been multiple remakes, which I have already listed above.

[tobyjones]

OK KO! Episodes 17-20

Know Your Mom

It was time for another good Carol episode! This one came together for us very quickly, and ended up being a very simple and sweet story about KO and Carol's relationship. It was originally written with Rad and Enid as KO's sounding boards, but we thought it would be fun to bring in Brandon and A Real Magic Skeleton for a little change of pace. I love the way Ryann and Parker expanded their appearance into a funny running gag that ended up helping to further cement their personalities moving forward. In the outline we handed out, the Kactus Krew were not given a lot of specifics. We had figured they would have an old school mob/organized crime type theme (but cactus). When we saw the first pitch with Succulentus portrayed as a nu-metal character, I was shocked. I remember being literally on the floor laughing,  a visceral physical reaction to how unexpected this take on the episode was. It was another situation where I was so unsure- can we do this? It is too insane? Is it "on-show"? All we knew for sure is that we all laughed, so we decided to go with our gut reaction and support it 100%. Jonathan Davis coming in to do the voice was another amazing development. He was the nicest guy in the world, and such a pleasure to work with! This especially felt great after my parents wouldn't let me see KoRn in concert when I was in 7th grade. Take that, mom and dad! 

We’re Captured

We aren't the first show to do a play on the sitcom "double-booking" trope with a villain, but we knew it would be super funny with our heroes and Lord Boxman. This was an incredibly enjoyable episode to write the story for. I remember hanging out in the writer's room with Ian, Dave and Erin just cracking ourselves up with how silly the episode starts and it just continues to escalate in ridiculousness from there. This was around the time we were first conceiving of TKO, so it was a helpful reminder that the show was in no way backing down from comedy. The concept for this story was shared with the board artists after the premise stage (I think in a big writing meeting, but it could have just been during lunch or something), and Ryann immediately took an interest in Professor Venomous. She then shared with us some early design concepts and ideas for Venomous (and his minion, who we'd later call Fink), and we were able to integrate them into the final outline. As with Know Your Mom, we knew the role Venomous was going to take in this episode and the series as a whole, but he was really given life thanks to the strong and specific POV of the board artists working on the episode. This was also a great early display of Boxman's family dynamic with the robots. Darrell and Shannon weren't even originally in this story, but Ryann and Parker REALLY wanted to include them. Parker pitched us the "daddy? may I wear my costume?" scene, which is something he observed in his real life. We were unsure, but we were willing to give him a chance to sell it in their pitch. I'm definitely glad we did! One final thing to mention about We're Captured is that our heroes lose in this episode. Isn't that fun?  Ryann Shannon on We’re Captured

Face Your Fears

Face Your Fears was conceived as a crucial stepping stone toward several key mid-season episodes, but it actually ended up being produced after TKO because we needed Dave and Haewon to tackle Legends of Mr. Gar first. This was the luxury of knowing that OK KO! would premiere with a month of episodes. We were working so far ahead that we could produce some episodes out of order and then make sure they aired IN order. (More on this in a future post...) Anyway, this episode provides a ton of important character development that ties to our big "mid-season finale" episodes, Plaza Prom and TKO. Gar manages to speak a sentence to Carol, which he repeats in Plaza Prom, and we get another hint of some darkness within KO. Among many other things! The concept of hopping through a bunch of character's linked fears in order of their plug-in connection is pretty complicated, but the board artists did an excellent job making it feel exciting and cool. Dave and Haewon were very excited to tackle something with this level of depth, and it shows in every scene. Figuring out how much to reveal in this episode was a challenge, and I'm very happy with the final result. Special regards to our design team for their work on this episode. All the different fearscapes are so distinct and so gorgeous. I was stunned when I started seeing these designs come in. In my opinion, this was the most impressively designed episode so far! Of course, since this episode they've continued to top themselves many times over. :)  Dave Alegre on Face Your Fears Everybody Likes Rad?

I've alluded to this before, but we took extra care to make sure that all the episodes  leading up to TKO were very balanced in terms of subject matter. We mapped out the whole half-season in advance, with many episodes simply listed as "ENID 1",  "CAROL 2" or "PLAZA EVENT" before we knew exactly what the stories were. We knew that Enid and Rad would have an equal number of episodes, and Everybody Likes Rad is "Rad 3". Much like "Enid 3" (You Have to Care), this is one of the first times we allowed an episode to spend some real time without KO as a main focus. This episode is a combination of two ideas. The first half comes from a pitch by Erin, and the second half derives from a concept Ian and I were sitting on from the previous summer. Neither "Rad's Viral Video" nor "Rad Goes Hollywood" felt like they could sustain a whole episode, but we realized there was a story to be told about how one could lead to the other. It worked! We ended up with something I'm really proud of. Geneva and Mira did a fantastic job making a hilarious episode that deals with sophisticated themes in a nuanced way. At every stage I was impressed at how far we were able to push this episode into unexpected tonal territory while still being 100% "the show". I especially love the melancholy-but-warm final scenes, which have caused "volcanoing" to be a term I commonly use in conversation. Geneva Hodgson on Everybody Likes Rad?

[langwrites]

Tag Game: 10 Questions:

Rules: Answer the questions, then create 10 more, and tag people.

Tagged by: @owlsofstarlight

1. Would you date any of your ocs?

Hmmm.

You know, given that I’m the cause of all their misery, ultimately, that would be a terrible idea.

If I had to choose (and not die), hrm. Well, Naviyd. Probably.

2. What kind of poster(s) would your oc have on their wall?

Naviyd has his father’s rather inaccurate, theistic world maps on his wall. They’re stitched somewhat haphazardly among more accurate records, diagrams, and a wonky drawing of what might someday be a pulley system.

And one nice sketch of a family of four, made by Khalil when he was six years old. It’s more aspirational than accurate, but Naviyd kept it there throughout his son’s entire absent adolescence.

3. If your oc found a time machine, would they use it? for what?

He’d probably tell himself to fight Zahara for custody of both twins.

4. Do any of your ocs have a catchphrase? If so, what?

Naviyd doesn’t see much point. Dude used to basically kill Kaltekan generals as a sacred mission, and he sure wasn’t going to make a career of that by sticking around and monologuing.

5. Tell me about one of your ocs hobbies.

Naviyd studies maps and architecture—which is why Gabilan is a lot more cavernous, winding, and mazelike than its squad design would imply—and spends his free time hunting from horseback with a bow. He does it mainly to keep his skills sharp.

If he wants to have fun, he finds someone and strikes up a friendship if he hasn’t already.

6. What inspired one of your favorite ocs?

I couldn’t choose. So, you get four.

Naviyd was inspired by...hm. Basically, I read a section of a Dungeons and Dragons Monster Manual (probably 3.5) and spotted the entry on copper dragons. My next thought was, “I’ve gotta have one of those.” Several more thoughts, several years, and one quick jaunt through CYB later, and Rikuto back-retconned his way into Naviyd’s personality, resulting in what he is today.

Oceanus was half-inspired by a wacky combination of Edward Elric and this dude named chaos (all lowercase) from Xenosaga. His affinity for storms is derived from a combination of my attempts to make a sorcerer character (D&D again), and the powers of Darker than BLACK’s Agent November 11 and BK-201/Black Reaper/Hei. He, too, has been through a lot of revisions to soften and sharpen different parts of his personality, until we get the procupine we have today.

Alena, for her part, is pretty directly derived from the powerset displayed by Tsunade back when I was first watching Naruto in like…middle school? She got a fancy coat from some bolt of inspiration I can’t recall now, and her personality ended up just being like… What I admired about people who could keep their kindness and strength in tough times. I think I read a few pretty dark stories the year I really worked nailing her personality down.

And finally, Lumina. Hoo boy. Originally, she was just a derivation—the spare, the younger twin, the goof to Alena’s mother’s stern nature. And over the years, Lumina went from the mere mirror to a stone-cold badass the more I read about some real shitty common tropes—the idea that a woman’s strength was always derived from a man, or that a queen couldn’t rule on her own, and so on. I thought, “Fuck that and the horse it rode in on,” resulting in this terrifying paladin who was just always good, regardless of what others thought.   

7. What kind of clothes does your oc like to wear?

Naviyd will wear anything that is a) warm and b) looks good on him. In that order. If he has a choice between almost dying of frostbite or impressing a foreign dignitary, he’s gonna pile on those furs and demand Lumina heat the castle somehow, dammit.

He tends to get a lot of his work done while wearing just a plain shirt and pants, slippers, and the biggest blanket he can find.

8. Does your oc believe in love at first sight?

Naviyd used to. It did not pan out at all.

Oceanus doesn’t, at least as far as it pertains to him.

Alena does.

Lumina does not, and never has.

9. If you took your ocs for one story and put them in an au, what au would you choose?

I kinda already did that, by allowing all of these Terramir kids to wander over to CYB. Granted, some of them didn’t have the longest lifespan, but I’m generally content with the way that worked out.

10. What is something your oc is afraid of?

Naviyd is afraid of bears. Does that count?

Siri’s questions:

1.What was the trickiest bits of worldbuilding you have ever done?

Tryin’ to figure out what the fuck was going on with Alanrian politics. They’re a mess of squabbling states, and I still can’t remember why.

And most of the rest of the continents are just kinda...there. Like, the Mishik come from a different continent entirely, as do the Xinfanese, but those aren’t visited during the course of the plot because the thing focuses on stopping an impending apocalypse that the Kaltekan Civil War allowed to happen.

It’s their responsibility.

2.Do you have any maps(you don’t need to post the map)? What was your favorite part of developing your geography?

Cooking the macaroni afterward.

3.Does your story have magic? What are its limitations, if yes?

They do have magic, but the upper limit varies from person to person…and being to being. It’s usually a question of what’ll kill you first. That’ll be your limit. Creatures born in the Dreamscape have an instinctive grasp of magic, though they may not be the strongest, and can generally only cross over to the real world when either stumbling through a random hole or finding a human counterpart to latch onto.

Dragons are… another story. They’re basically mid-tier gods, and they can’t walk the mortal world without a vessel.  

4.Does your main antagonist believe in god?

Well, dragons all do. They have a memory of their ancestors literally meeting the gods, wayyy back in their mythology.

5.Do you have secondary villains?

At least three, yeah.

6.How many words are your drafts?

I have no fuckin’ idea.

7.What is your favorite method of outlining?

Not to do so?

8.Which one of your ocs is queer?(if multiple, mention them all!)

Uh. The ones that I remember off-hand:

Oceanus (demihet bi)

Alena (demipan)

Khalil (aro pan)

Tirane (bi)

Riyaz (aroace)

Mitra (agender aroace)

Lumina (demibiro het)

Naviyd (aro demibi)

9. If you took your ocs for one story and put them in an au, what au would you choose? (Stealing from above cause this was a fun question)

CYB, natch.

10.Which of all the names in all your books, including characters, places, animals etc., is your favorite?

The names?

Hm.

I think my favorite stroke of brilliance was Lumina’s name in the first place. Sure, it means “light” in at least one language, but the fun part is that it’s also an unit of measurement for levels of light. Once I realized I could make a theme, I started spreading it around. Her sister became Luxana, while her older niece is Alena, both of which mean “light” as well. Her family last name, adopted upon being raised to nobility, is also an old reference to how people used to measure light: Lambert. Her sister’s last name now means “fire,” which is, again, a source of light.

And so on and so forth. There’s a theme.

I ain’t gonna tag anyone since it’s late and my brain’s fried. Night, all.

[mothermaidenclone-blog]

Geostorm or I Got Out of my PJs and Left the House for This?

If it isn’t clear by now, I love a B-movie, but Geostorm was pushing it, even for me. I’ve genuinely gained more enjoyment from decade-old films that cost fifty pence second hand in CEX than from this new, actually released in a cinema, film. I’m sure the rest of the internet has already done a stellar job of tearing Geostorm apart, so I don’t need to add to that particular discourse. However, it was a sci-fi film with women in it, so here we go.

*Geostorm spoilers follow*

One of the first female characters we meet is Hannah (Talitha Elina Bateman), the daughter of our white, male, short haired and short tempered protagonist, a scientist who solves problems with pugilism, called Jake (Gerard Butler). Hannah is immediately a contrast to her father; he is day drinking at this point whilst she repairs a solar generator. As well as being intelligent and mechanically adept, Hannah is shown to be caring, worrying about her father’s welfare and safe return, but she’s also not afraid to tell it like it is, berating him for his lack of parenting skills. Hannah is therefore shown to be quite a complex character, who displays a number of positive aspects to her personality, in her tiny span of screen time.

Another surprisingly good role model is Sarah Wilson (Abbie Cornish). She is introduced first by her title, Agent, before she is established as being in a relationship with Max Lawson (Jim Sturgess). Admittedly, this all happens within a few lines of dialogue, but I appreciate the gesture. Furthermore, she is shown as deeply committed to her career, and it’s her boyfriend Max that is the sentimental one - he doesn’t care if their forbidden relationship is revealed but she is as devoted to her rank as to her partner, if not more so. It was a good and fairly rare example of a woman being less emotional than a man. In addition to this, she is a Secret Service agent, arguably one of the most stereotypically machismo professions under the sun, whilst Max occupies a more bureaucratic role. The only real downside to her character is that after all of this solid motivation and personality being established, she capitulates to Max’s bonkers plan to kidnap the president very readily, and without much explanation. She forcefully refuses a first time, but then agrees almost instantaneously a second time with no real change in circumstances.

Women continue to occupy positions of power in Geostorm, which is a nice surprise in this otherwise terrible movie. The commander of the space station is a woman, Ute Fassbinder (Alexandra Maria Lara). She exerts an air of authority, level-headedness and control, but unfortunately is constantly overshadowed by Jake, who doubts her from the get-go. Her initial assertion that she should sacrifice herself to save the space station that she is in charge of, “I stay, I’m the commander”, is completely trampled by Jake, who stays behind to be the hero and maintain control. Whilst Ute does remain with him to help, Jake physically saves her from danger twice, once landing on top of her and then just staying there for a bit for no real reason. This is the endemic problem with this film - capable women exist, but they are not the main characters, Jake is, and he will punch everyone in the face in the name of science until that is abundantly clear.

One final named character exists, Dana (Zazie Beetz), a cybersecurity expert and hacker. Her inclusion as a black actress in this role is a small step towards dispelling the trope of all tech-proficient people being pasty white men in basements. However, she is one of only two credited black women in the cast, so Geostorm is hardly a paragon of racial equality. Dana not only has immense skill when it comes to computers, but also a bucket-load of common sense, as she not only sees through Max’s feeble efforts to conceal his relationship with Sarah, but also coins the term “bro-spiracy”, which basically sums up the garbage plot of this film.

Overall, there are some surprisingly strong women in this awful film, who display a wide variety of commendable skills. However, Geostorm is not about them, it’s about brothers and explosions and brotherhood and punching stuff and bros and asserting your masculinity through gritted teeth. It’s also about a satellite that somehow makes fireballs burst from the pavement in Hong Kong, so maybe I should stick to my original point that you should all just stay in your snuggies and play some Zelda or something instead of witnessing this nonsense.            

And now for some asides:

I did enjoy that there was an actual geostorm progress bar and countdown timer.

According to the disaster map, Ireland seemed to be basically fine, which I can only assume is a karmic reward for their constant, low-level terrible weather.

Will us Brits ever be free of the awful fate of being the corniest villains ever?