#Vic goes to CC

[peanutbutterandbananasandwichs]

When asked what Sam and Cas would shoplift if they could no consequences and nothing essential just a thing they really want lol. Jared said they would steal Baby, even though technically they are allowed to drive it (me lol WELL). Misha then segued that into Sam and Cas would steal A baby.

Misha: "Sam and Cas would steal a child and raise it as their own"

Jared: "That would be a fucked up child."

Misha: Well. Jack.

Me: sastiel co-parenting RIGHTS

[darcyolsson]

[simmingwormly]

Wormville: Rotation 11: Devir-Jilleni Children Update

The promised companion post to the gameplay update for this family! This one will contain teenagers in love. (I don't think there are any other content warnings. Except maybe for... the Beldines? Yeah. Contains the Beldines.)

Color sharing: Cedric - Iulius and Beatrice - Victor, otherwise everyone has their own this time around.

The round starts on Gina Jilleni, born in rotation 8, aging up to a teen! Just for completion's sake, her personality is 10/4/1/0/7 (that is some Jilleni personality if I've ever seen one!) and her traits are Insane, Light Sleeper, Shy and now Computer Wiz!

Her aspirations are Romance and Popularity! She does have a streak of business-minded in her, though, since the LTW she rolled is to have 5 successful businesses. It's no wonder, given how much the clothing store has influenced her family.

And a teenage birthday in Wormville traditionally means a party where all other teens from the village are invited, so the youngsters can get to know each other! Other than that, the Jillenis also invited their extended family.

Fabian Beldine, Gina's childhood friend, happens to fall into both of those categories.

"Is it true that your mom fought in the Temple?"

"Yeah. She's... you know. She's a really dramapilled fightmaxxer."

"I thought I'd say hi to her and uncle Vic, but they must've gone somewhere."

"They'll come back. Just don't go looking for them. Trust me. You don't wanna find them."

Yeah. She wouldn't want to find them.

(In the hot tub? In Beatrice's hot tub? During your niece's birthday party? You beasts.)

Let's just say the birthday party was a success. What's more, Gina wasn't the only one of the Jilleni children to grow up - little Xaive turned into a child soon after! This is her! I really like her looks, since it seems like she's a little more Bennett-y and less of a mini Beatrice (but you know how the joke goes, with those two, it's practically unrecognizable).

Her personality is 8/3/10/1/7 and her 3t2 traits are Angler, Genius and Loser. (which I personally find very inspiring) Her name, by the way, breaks the Jilleni pattern of vaguely Italian-sounding names, because she's actually named after one of my old Sims I had in TS4 when I played a really long legacy. I unfortunately don't have pictures of the original Xaive or anything more than a few storylines from the legacy archived, but I wanted to preserve her as a little reference.

This is Gina's reaction to seeing Xaive post age-up for the first time. In my honest opinion, she might be overreacting a bit.

Sophia (more on her later) rolls the want to learn a skill, so she tries her hand at painting, and discovers her new hobby!

She also lost her high poly custom hair privileges. It was an accident. I really like that hair, however it comes in so many swatches, and when reducing my cc pile, I deleted almost all of them and only kept one per all of the major hair colors. Sophia got a haircut out of it.

"Would you tell me how you and mom fell in love?"

"Well, we spent a lot of time together. Our parents lived in one big house, so we even used to share one room. And I've always adored your mom. She was my best friend. I've also always thought she was the most beautiful girl in the entire world."

"I wish someone thought I was the most beautiful."

"One day, someone definitely will."

"But when? Not soon, I bet."

"You are a little too young."

"I bet I could get a boyfriend if I borrowed mom's or Hannah's makeup."

"Do you want to wear makeup, or do you just want your classmates to notice you more?"

"I... dunno. Does every girl wear makeup?"

"No, they don't."

"And do boys? Do you wear makeup? I sometimes think you do!"

"That's because I do! But just a little. I like looking nice. But you can look nice even without makeup. Maybe you can ask mom or Hannah later. They can show you how it's done. But don't... stress over it. You're beautiful the way you are, and you can just be yourself and have fun. Boys will start to notice you anyway. I bet girls, too!"

"I'd like girls to notice me! I have a crush on a girl, but I won't tell you, because it's a secret!"

Little Sophia might be too young to worry about dating, but her older sister, a teenager - and a Romance Sim to boot! - thinks of little else these days. She keeps returning to her birthday party, and the moment she danced with Cedric Anora. Maybe she can try hanging out with him after school?

When she finds him, he's playing soccer with his sibling. He does everything with his sibling. Gina secretly hopes Deborah won't want to tag along, but if they do, at least she'll befriend them, too!

"Wow. You surely can play!"

"Right? I thought of turning pro, but nah, I want to work with my brains."

"Yeah, right. Me too. But I still like working out."

"And do you like playing soccer?"

"Yea- no? I mean, I don't know. Never done it, to be honest."

"Then go put your workout clothes on! I'll teach you!"

"So, this is the ball. What you do with it? You kick it!"

"I think I knew that part."

"I'm back!"

"How was the shower?"

"I feel like a person again. Thank you for waiting for me."

"No problem. I really enjoyed the game."

"Yeah, me too. And I..."

"Well, I was thinking-"

"I was wondering-"

"Would you like to go somewhere?"

I interrupt this report with Gina gossiping about... Broomer, Nico's cat.

"I've heard he likes chin scritches."

"No way. That's hardcore!"

Gina and Cedric decide to catch a bus and go on a trip Downtown that offers a park that is a little more grown-up that Wormville's playground and a little less "untamed wilderness" than the untamed wilderness that surrounds their village. (and much less under the noses of their parents than any of the nature-y holy sites of Wormville)

It's a place where they can continue trading stories about the weirdos in their family tree.

"Yeah. Aunt Aranni's really crazy. I've heard she was a... dramapilled fightmaxxer."

"Okay, Fabian."

"C'mon! I grew up with him! Stop laughing!"

"You stop laughing!"

"Now- you're- laughing more!"

"Noooo- stop tickling meee!"

"Don't worry about it, though. I have crazier family members. Iulius tore down his house and is building a fucking prison."

"Holy shit, for real?"

"Yeah. For real."

"Like, I know that he bulldozed his house and that they're building something new, I mean, we live next door, but a prison? Wow."

"The guy's cooked."

"No kidding. Wait. You're related?"

"Unfortunately. He's my sperm donor. Doesn't really deserve to be called 'father'."

"I see. Did he... dump your mom?"

"Yeah. Right when she told him she was pregnant."

"What a dickhead!"

"Right?"

Speaking of said dickhead, unbeknownst to the two, Iulius was just at the other side of the very same park. Having problems in his marriage and even more problems with the stressful building process, the guardsman decided to unwind. Unwind in the manly way! He collected "the boys" (the only male relatives that are on speaking terms with him - Victor and Fabian Beldine) and took them break some sweat.

Unfortunately, the sportiest activity he got the Beldines to agree to was darts.

"That would be the end of this match! A resolute victory for yours truly! Fabian, close second! Are you alright, Sergeant? One would've expected a professional soldier to have a steadier aim."

"I was letting you win, so you can grow your confidence."

"Ah, I see. Maybe next time I could play with my glasses off?"

"And I can just close my eyes. So... you don't have to keep letting us win."

"Exactly. We need to be considerate to our troops."

"Keep making fun of me, you two! I lost, because I was distracted."

"By what?"

"Watching the perimeter, keeping you safe!"

They continue playing, since Iulius insists on a rematch, but soon, a different family arrives.

"Well, well, well... fancy meeting you here, Zachary!"

Iulius, thinking, "it's not gay if he's wearing a corset it's not gay if he's wearing a corset it's not..."

Surprisingly, Victor and Zachary don't end up fighting.

Zachary cries for reasons that are Victor-related, but have nothing to do with this encounter.

(Victor actually ends up exchanging slaps with old Agatha who accosts him, but that's one Jilleni-unrelated screenshot too many.)

Fabian, that's starting to be a pattern.

Both Gina and Cedric actually roll the fear of using the public toilets, which is something they unfortunately both end up doing. Gina takes it a step further and she pulls out the cleaning supplies before sitting on that thing.

That luckily doesn't put a hamper on the vibe. Gina and Cedric both end up leaving for Wormville ending the date on their first kiss and establishing each other as their girlfriend/boyfriend. (the best screenshot from that is what I used as the "thumbnail" of this post)

Home, things aren't that peachy. Tension and conflicts between Felicia and Hannah affect the children deeply, especially little Naomi, who doesn't want her moms to stop loving one another and decides to help them with the use of a clever book. She is ultimately bound to fail, but let's not dwell on that in this post.

"Ben... Let's talk."

"Is it about Feli and Hannah?"

"No, actually... it's the baby."

"Oh... is something wrong, love?"

"No - I mean, it might be."

"Okay, tell me. I'm here for you."

"The baby might not be yours. Or Felicia's. It could be someone's completely different, and I have no clue who. I didn't even register when the accident happened, I just noticed that I was pregnant again and-"

"Shh, it's alright. It's alright. It doesn't matter whose it is biologically. Naomi isn't genetically ours either, and she's still one of our girls, right?"

"Yes... I was just... worried. You really don't mind?"

"I will be praying the baby is mine - or at least Feli's - just because it's... I guess more comfortable to think about? But if it turns out it isn't, life goes on. And I'll love them anyway."

Soon after that conversation, the child gets born. Sophia is over the moon to have a new sister!

And this is baby Ida. She's Stubborn, Friendly, and her personality points are 8/1/8/2/10!

Just from a look at her face, the mystery of her parentage was solved, but a paternity test was done anyway, just to be sure. It turns out that by a sheer power of luck (and also Beatrice being naturally more careful with her casual lovers and clients than with her partners at home), little Ida's father is Bennett Jilleni after all!

(And outside of universe, I am putting Bea and Ben on contraception - I thought I've already done so after Xaive, but evidently not, and they don't need a fifth child. Bea's LTW of having 6 grandkids is still more than likely to come true with four of them.)

Naomi stops her cousin Winter on the street and promotes the new clothing store.

After Hannah's death, everybody is uneasy. Little Xaive wakes up in the middle of the night, having a nightmare about Genevieve Celwitch. To be honest, many such cases.

"Hello, Gina. Is your mother available?"

"Sorry, she's not. Want me to give her a message?"

"No, that is not necessary. I just wanted to speak to her to check how she was holding up, but I am glad to have reached you, too. Are you okay?"

"Yeah. I'm... fine, I guess. It's a lot..."

"I believe so. Death is always horrid to bear, not to mention that of your parent figure."

"Uhm... But the girls are taking it worse than me."

"Naturally. You are the oldest, you might feel obligated to be strong for them. You don't actually have to - it is not your job."

"Sorry. I don't really want to talk about it right now."

"I see. Well, hold on tight. Give my regards to your sisters, to your mother, and to Bennett. And if you all wanted to come for a visit, the doors of the Splat are always open to you."

"Thank you, uncle Vic. Goodbye."

(Victor actually called Gina - they're very close, since she spent more than a week with the Beldines on a family vacation in rotation 10, that's also when she befriended Fabian.)

And last but not least, another teenager joins the fray! This is Sophia Jilleni! Just for a quick revision, she was born in rotation 9, her personality is 10/5/4/2/8 and her traits are Evil, Clumsy, Perceptive and Heavy Sleeper.

She's now a Fortune/Family Sim, and her LTW is to succeed in the Showbiz career.

...and yes, those are Hannah's glasses.

[partnersatfazbear]

Analysis of The Real Jake (SPOILERS)

I can't decide whether to make this post a stream-of-consciousness style or group it into evidence for x... but since it's easier, I'll just write my thoughts as I go. Although a lot of this is factual ties to, say, FNAF 4, things like relating Margie to Henry are just my own headcanon and you can do with that what you will AKA don't take this all too seriously, but have fun with it. There’s also specific notes about Michael Afton, for those that just want to know what was said regarding him (presumably).

Before I start, please note I've had three hours of sleep in the last... 28 hours? IDK I can't math, especially not on this little sleep. So, there may be errors. I tried to make a note on things I was unsure about, too. 

Note: I wrote this before the Evan=CC theory was all but confirmed. Although I believe this theory from the logbook, I think a lot of these notes are still valid.

Read my notes under the cut:

Margie shares similar physical appearance to Henry: Pg 84 “The window fan blew a lock of her shoulder-length brown hair across her upper lip so it looked like she had a mustache.”

“Mrs. Afton” stand in is mentioned: Pg 86 “...it had been four years since his Mom had died...” (Jake is 9 in the story)

I notice when Scott mentions plaid. Pg 87 “...a green-and-blue plaid plush chair...” I mostly wanted to note this since canonically, Henry had a green plaid shirt.

“William” stand in is mentioned. Pg 89 “And you know he thinks about you [Jake] all the time?” “So, he has to concentrate on what he's doing... ...I don't want him thinking about me and end up shooting himself in the foot or something.” Pg 102 “Yeah, I did. [I spilled some chocolate ice cream] Right on my shirt!” Pg 122 “I did that today! [While playing a DDR like game, breaking a shoelace.]” (Admittedly, I only counted these because I headcanon William is much more of a bumbling fool than he appears. It comes up very often as you can see... although you could write it off as Evan just trying to relate to his kid.)

“William” stand in is mentioned. Pg 92 “...Margie was pretty sure Evan couldn't afford to replace a washer and dryer” and “...Evan, at his rank, could barely afford her” Pg 110 “Gillian's house shared stlying with Evan's, but hers was probably four times bigger.” (Again, I headcanon William and his family is on the low end of middle class, if not lower, in terms of income. Particularly, the house is cramped.)

“Mrs. Afton” stand in is mentioned. Pg 93 “First, Jake's Mom was killed.” Pg 139 “The mom's dead.” (You could infer that she died via something akin to a car crash in the context of the story, however if you reflect it to the games given the commonalities, I like to think of this as confirmation that William murdered her, given the word 'killed' is used.)

Margie records herself on her cell phone. Pg 93 (and on other pages) (Again referencing my headcanon for Henry, in which he records ideas/diaries often. At minimum, Henry is referred to as “Cassette Man” in PizzaSim so... I just thought it could make for an interesting comparison.)

Jake mentions his “friends”. Pg 99 “Patty and Davey... Vic... and the twins... Ellie and Evie... Kyle, Clay, and Garrett” (Also, he isn't mentioned until later, but there's his best friend Brandon, too. I noted these in reference to CC talking about his 'friends', either IRL or the plushies. I assume his IRL friends are the MCI victims. The number doesn't add up though. I really, really wanted to make a connection about the twins, considering Charlie and Sammy are twins, but there wasn't enough evidence to write it off as anything other than a coincidence. Also... Clay, really? We need another double name in this series? Ugh.)

What's your favorite flavor? Chocolate Pg. 102 “What flavor did you get?” “Chocolate. Duh.” (This is a stretch, but it did remind me of Help Wanted's final level in the main game, where you're asked to choose your favorite cake flavor. Although, they're discussing ice cream here.)

Maybe some insight into William's personality? Pg. 103 “You ever do that, Evan?” “What?” “Let off steam.” “Me? No. Steam is pretty much what keeps me going.” (Just more evidence that William is obsessed with his work. You could imply “steam” implies he runs like a machine, but that's stretching a bit.)

Pg. 113 -118 (Jake climbs out of his window to run off to play at the arcade with his friend. Obvious parallel to the child in Midnight Motorist, although it's daytime and no animatronics/fursuits luring him.) There is this, on Pg 121 also. Jake says, “We played all the racing games. I love racing games.”

PURPLE Pg 121 “...did you get a slushie at the arcade? I got one. I got grape. It turned my tongue purple.” “My tongue's purple, too!” “Purple power!” (Uh, do I really need to explain this? I should note that Evan is the one mentioning “grape”. I guess William likes grape flavor and purple.)

'Michael' is mentioned. Sort of a stand in for Michael Afton, but it should be noted that Michael and Evan are brothers in this universe. Pg 126, 127 “Michael...lived in Europe for a few years...” “Michael's a serious dude. He's, well, a little different. He's intense about making money...the way he is about it... can make him seem like he's not human.” “So, he's like a cyborg with bad programming?” Michael has some dialogue: “You must excersize caution. You could get chocolate on my suit, and that would be bad. Very, very bad.” (The very very bad thing is a running joke in the family, which is why this comes up. I don't have a lot to say about it, though. I think Michael [Afton] being obsessed with money seems a bit counter intuitive to how we know him, but who knows? I also want to note that Evan doesn't seem antagonistic towards Michael; in fact, he “hate[s] to ask him for favors”.)

Also, Pg 141 “His [Michael's] flat, gruff voice was unmistakable.” Michael is also the first one to hear his father is dead and informs Margie about it. “I have been notified that Evan's dead.” Pg 142 “She had only met Michael the one time, and she knew the way he processed the world was very different from what was “normal”” Michael also states to Margie: “I've got Evan's will... you're Jake's guardian and he left you the house and some savings. I'm the executor.” Margie also says: “He[Michael]'s a numbers genius, manages money for the wealthy people and has made a killing doing it.” “He's not a bad guy. He just doesn't know how to connect. He doesn't feel the way we do.” (Just more Michael characterization.)

Direct FNAF 4 easter egg references: Pg 128 “...the IV stand lurking in the corner of the room” Pg 129 “...and the line of perscription medication bottles marching across the top of the chest of drawers”

Margie is more than a nanny and possibly in love with Evan: Pg. 139 “She'd come to love Evan, too... like a brother.” Pg 140 “...she was included in the outings, movie nights, game nights, and storytelling time...” Pg 149 “...she wanted Evan to be more than just a boss, and being in his room when he was gone made her feel like a lovelorn stalker.” “Love him like a brother... She snorted. Boy, had she been lying to herself.” Pg 158 “What she was feeling called for a screaming fit or a total mental breakdown.” (Yeah, this is just me reading too much into this for Willry content, haha... But still. I am determined that Margie is a Henry stand-in.)

'I will put you back together' Pg 140 “I'm trying to bring you home whole.” (Evan is discussing “no man left behind” with his son, Jake. I think this is obvious.)

William's home office? Pg. 149 “When he was home, she'd go in and vacuum or put away laundry... ...when he was gone...coming in here felt like an invasion of privacy.” “Evan's room would be her room.” “...I'd feel like I was sleeping in your bed, she thought.” “...the room felt discretely masculine.” “The walls were covered in family photos.” “The shelves were stuffed with fiction... mysteries to classics, nonfiction... how-to books...from rebuilding a car engine to planting a garden.”

FNAF 4 reference. Pg 152 “Outside, a dog barked.” (You can hear a dog barking as ambient noise during nights when playing FNAF 4.)

Other notes:

It happens a lot, but one of the main things in the book is the doll Simon and how Jake talks to it. This is very blatantly a reference to the Golden Freddy Plush (“Psychic Friend Fredbear”). The story confirms it's Jake's father, Evan, talking through it. Although it makes the one scene in FNAF 4 a little wonky (the only scene where we see Purple Guy), I think it's pretty much confirmed that it's William talking to CC now. Obviously, we already suspected this due to Sister Location's “Secret Room”. In this story, Evan says he did it because he wanted to give Jake some hope he would live. Combined with both the IV/medicine bottle easter eggs (in the story and FNAF 4) I think it's plausible to assume that CC was taken home after the Bite of '83 for a period of time before he passed away. I will admit, also, that Evan definetly comes off as a very caring father (in comparison to how we presume William is based on what we've seen of him as a person; although I argued this before on this blog, I don't think William hates his kids. I think he's neglectful, moreso as the story goes on. I think he resents Michael for many reasons but I won't go into that here. I just don't think he's the abusive monster the fanbase interprets him to be—at least not early on.)

The cabinet reminds me a lot of the closets in the novel series. A built in shelf with a doll in it. A doll that represents a child. Considering Margie tends to this doll (see Pg. 130-135), I have to draw more parallels between her and Henry.

The fan is mentioned A LOT. I don't really know why, but I guess we can't help but think of every single FNAF office when it's brought up. Specifically, on Pg. 106, Margie mentions the fan in her room is as loud as a jet engine and the sound made her nervous. Once again, I'm reminded of PizzaSim. Seriously, screw you fan.

The heat is mentioned a lot, too. I know the story takes place in summer, but this did remind me of Pizza Sim.

Pg. 93 “Margie sat down in the faded blue webbed lawn chair that was set up, for reasons she never understood, in front of the shelves by the stairs.” (I noted this because it's specifically called out and I don't know why.)

Margie talks about why she's working for Evan: Pg. 95 “I didn't get the internship I applied for.” I like to think her and Mia (from 1280) were after the same internship. (I may be misremembering, but I'm pretty sure Mia mentioned an internship at the hospital.)

Jake is mentioned to have brown hair, green eyes. His favorite color is green. He also wears green often. I couldn't find anything really interesting about it. It would make more sense as a Puppet reference, tbh (because of the green bracelet (and eyes? I may be remembering wrong) I guess it's also worth noting that Elizabeth has green eyes.

Pg 135 “Are you afraid people will think you're murdering me?” “...I could end you so quickly you'd never make a sound.” (Just an odd conversation between Jake and Margie. Margie is joking here, obviously.) Also, Pg. 136 “I just figured your [Jake's] wires got crossed or your circuits were frying.” (Admittedly, I don't know what to make of this. Could be a reference to Robot-CC, if you believe that or MikeBot [I don't], but more likely just ironic dialogue. It could also reference Jake's future in the Stichwraith?)

Pg 139 “Sometimes, Margie wished she was like one of the robots Jake liked so much.” (Although I can't really compare this to Henry, I did write William with this mindset and thought it was worth mentioning.)

Pg 141+ So, Evan dies overseas (he's a soldier). (I think this could be hinting that William has been springlocked around the time CC passes away. Jake has been home for some time after his diagnosis so we can infer based on that and the easter eggs that CC was brought home to die in peace. At the very least, William's probably very absent during this time. Possibly brought in for questioning but not arrested. I don't know. I feel like there's something to this.)

Pg 154 “Dave's at work.” (Why? Can we not use established names? Aghhh)

Pg 155 “The ambulance arrived at 11:32.” (I don't know why this is stated so outright. I couldn't find a reason, except that a few paragraphs earlier they say it will arrive by noon. I don't know why it's so specific, but I felt like noting it anyway.)

Pg 159 “Five people. Five sets of eyes. And none of them noticed...” (Yeah. We all know how important 5 is in FNAF.)

Three medical personel are mentioned. One at the end is named Nancy [No Last Name Given], but I like to think its a reference to Man in 1280 and we're dealing with Heracles Hospital once more, although it's never said in this story. Speaking of, the only thing that really stood out to me in 1280's story was that a billionare funded the restoration of the hospital. I like to headcanon that was Henry's doing—I imagine him obscessing over overcompensating for his mistakes by giving back in every way possible, even if it isn't directly related to him.

So, this post only took two hours of my life. I hope someone gets some use out of it, be it for my intended Willry purposes or maybe those Michael fans that are curious about it. If you enjoyed this post, let me know. I'd love to write up more of these if I have the time.

I have other write-ups on this blog, too. Just search fnaf theories on my blog page!

[what-a-messsss]

1x6 rewatch

Ok, I finished Longmire a week and change ago, so naturally I’ve started over, to, like, take notes for fic writing purposes, and because that’s just how I roll.  But tonight, instead of spamming @cminerva​ with 200+ random Facebook messages overnight, I figured I’d just yell about shit here.  Even though I basically haven’t been on Tumblr since the great porn purge of 2018 in solidarity with so many of the queer folx and sex workers who had their content targeted while the site was leaving Nazis and shit totally in the clear.  (Still boo at that.)  Anyhoo.  Starting this shit.

Shit, I just cackled.  Whyyyyyyy, why, why, whyyy the fuck did they name a character “Branch” in this show?  Bless this cc though.

Oh, Lucian.  You old goat.  “You don’t negotiate with terrorists indeed.”  You magnificent asshole.  What the hell is wrong with you.  Actually, no, never mind.  Even I don’t have time for that long of a list.

Good lord, but Branch’s jeans are tight.  He may be a complete butthead, but this remains an exemplary show for jeans.

And then Walt wanders in to his own fundraiser basically by accident, after Henry has clearly gone to considerable effort to put it together.  There’s a band, for pete’s sake, and not a bad one.  And if he hadn’t had that random piece of meat, I can only imagine that Walt wouldn’t have shown up at all.  There’s a difference between focusing on the policing and avoiding the politics and being a shitty friend, and Walt basically set up camp on the wrong side of that line.

Interesting to see the slightly odd exchange between Henry and Omar.  [9:30]  I get the feeling that there’s not much love lost there.  I bet there’s a story or 7 there.  I’m relieved to see Omar with the beard after watching the rest of the series.  It was startling to see him without earlier in the rewatch, and weirdly off-putting.  ...That’s right; probably most, if not all, of the issue between Henry and Omar is how he hunts: for profit, more than he needs, “punishing” this killer bear, etc.  Ugh, Omar, you creepy letch.

Ok, I get that being from Philly is basically the only personality trait that they’ve given Vic so far, but holy hell, does she only have clothing with the Philly Fliers logo on it?  I’m still kind of cheesed off with how the writers short-changed Vic.  KS is a pretty phenomenal actor and she did get some juicy elements to work with eventually, but still not what feels like she could have done.

Pfft, and Lucian is just sitting behind the Sheriff desk.  $10 says that was his chair, too, and Walt just never bothered to replace it.  Ew.

Wow.  I think I had forgotten that way back in S1 Walt was threatening somebody dismemberment by bear to coerce a confession.  Also, this little shit in nooooo way qualifies for TLJ to play him.  Rude.  Oh, sure, and here’s Walt with his flaming hypocrisy, here to light the way to moral self-righteousness.  “We can’t be torturing and murdering people, no matter how right we think we are.  Somebody’s got to be the sheriff, or else we’re all just animals.  What the world needs is more human beings.”  WALT.  You literally just coerced a confession out of someone under threat of violent, horrible death.  You may feel you have the moral high-ground over this guy, but FFS, standing knee deep in shit only makes you lord over the people standing waist deep in it.  You’re still knee deep in shit.  

And then he goes on moralizing about entrapment.  YOU ARE SUCH A FUCKING HYPOCRIT.  And yet, I still miss this Walt in later seasons.  The guy who would talk to animals, and wasn’t so blindered by his own vendetta against Jacob that he couldn’t see anything past his pinhole focus.

[lugembe05]

Hii nchi ni ngumu sana nakumbuka shairi langu pendwa sana la Henry Barlow

Today I did my share

In building the nation.

I drove the permanent secretary

To an important urgent function

In fact to a luncheon at the Vic.

The menu reflected its importance

Cold Bell beer with small talk,

Then fried chicken with niceties

Wine to fill the hollowness of the laughs

Ice-ream to cover the stereotype jokes

Coffee to keep the PS awake on return journey.

I drove the permanent secretary back.

He yawned many times in the back of the car

Then to keep awake, he suddenly asked,

Did you have any lunch friend?

I replied looking straight ahead

And secretly smiling at his belated concern

That I had not, but was sliming!

✍️✍️✍️✍️✍️✍️✍️✍️

Hapa sasa ndio nakuja kumuelewa alichokimaanisha ndugu yetu @masoudkipanya katika picha hii✍️

Upon which he said with a seriousness

That amused more than annoyed me,

Mwananchi, I too had none!

 I attended to matters of state.

Highly delicate diplomatic duties you know,

And friend, it goes against my grain,

Causes me stomach ulcers and wind.

Ah, he continued, yawning again,

The pains we suffer in building the nation!

So the PS had ulcers too!

My ulcers I think are equally painful

Only they are caused by hunger,

No sumptuous lunches!

                             

#So_two_nation_builders

Arrived home this evening

With terrible stomach pains

The result of building the nation –

   -Different ways.

Cc

@masoudkipanya

@ud_kona

@maendeleoforum

@staciangowi

@laxy_tz

@official_breina

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@richardMabala

[princeashy]

'That's for you, bitch': CC Sabathia goes off, gets ejected

'That's for you, bitch': CC Sabathia goes off, gets ejected

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ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — It’s unclear when — or if — CC Sabathia will throw another pitch for the Yankees, but the last one he threw on Thursday was memorable.

The left-hander was ejected after he drilled Tampa Bay catcher Jesus Sucre with the first pitch of the bottom of the sixth with the Yankees leading 11-0, following a warning by home-plate umpire Vic Carapazza in the top of the…

[futuristicsweetscandy-blog]

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[peanutbutterandbananasandwichs]

Jared was talking about the Soulless Sam "workout montage".

Misha: "that scene was designed for people to masturbate to."

Jared corpses. Like just keels over haha.

Jared: "(to Misha): you're welcome, happy to be of service."

[darcyolsson]

please, do tell us why matthew will/won't die

thank u, anon, for endorsing me

enjoy an extremely long meta analysis on what i think will happen to matthew fairchild in chain of iron (+ chain of thorns)

ETA: the new tungle jungle update killed list formatting so all my bullet points are now below each other instead of having sub points but its Fine, i’m FINE, u just have to read over it i guess, let’s get to it

let’s start out with some reasons why matthew is extremely unlikely to die (spoiler warning for chog and tid!!!)

plot protection! matthew is more plot protected than.. literally anyone imo. the storyline of his secret and his romance with cordelia are two reasons he’s very unlikely to die because there’s too much to be resolved. killing him off would mean leaving those plotlines entirely unresolved.

similarly, matthews deep mental health issues funnily enough protect him from dying. cc never kills off characters who are struggling with themselves. (jessamine is the exception to this, more on that later)

same goes for the fact that matthew is bi- lgbt characters generally don’t die* in cc’s writing. she avoids the kill your gays trope like hell which, tbh, good for us???

not as stong of an argument, but it would make tlh too similar to tid- killing off the herondale’s parabatai who’s also interested in the main girl? yeah. i know cassie recently spoke about how she doesn’t really care for comparisons between tlh and tid, but i feel like this would be pushing it.

but then again, there’s a Lot of reasons why matthew might be dead as hell by the end of coi i’m sorry

most of all, book two madness! shit always goes down in the second book. cassie has also hinted at Shit Going Down in coi, and considering a lightwood already died in chog, i wouldnt be surprised if a main dies

“But Victoria Why On Earth Would That Be Matthew” well! because literally everybody else Cannot die:

it won’t be anna, alastair or thomas bc of said avoidance of kill your gays (And they still need to kiss kiss fall in love); grace, lucie, james and cordelia are simply too important to the plot for cc to kill them; and jesse’s... already dead idk what to tell u

i’m aware this leaves out christopher too, but tbh? i wouldn’t be too surprised if he dies. the only thing saving him rn are that he still has to marry grace if we’re following the family tree and that he has to invent fire messages but....... those are attainable goals for a single book imo (unlike matthew sorting out his Stuff) so... Perhaps it’s gonna be kit but thats a whole nother post

yeah i know i also just listed a bunch of reasons why matthew wont die but bear w me

so why matthew? because, plot-wise, there’s advantages to him dying, that other characters’ deaths wouldn’t have:

it would solve the love triangle. as a fairstairs it pains me to say this but it’s fairly straightforward: matthew dies, the gracelet is destroyed, jordelia lives happily ever after. we know jordelia will probably be endgame, so.. yeah.

on that same note: matthew doesn’t have a love interest besides cordelia. we know we won’t be seeing the tlh characters in another series, so everybody that lives has to get their happily ever after, which in cc’s case means being happily married. if i recall correctly, the only main characters that have ever ended up single at the end of their books were tda characters that we know we will see again in twp.

he isn’t on the family tree. we know for a fact that we can’t trust the family tree, but i think it’s unlikely for cc to just... ignore something as big as that.

but vic, wouldn’t a dead person be on the family tree? good question! that leaves us with our third option: matthew dies, but doesn’t die, aka downworlder/disowned matthew

basically, the whole idea is that matthew either becomes a downworlder and loses contact w the gang, or he gets stripped of his runes/disowned for what he did to charlotte

it would be a way for him to distance himself from the shadowhunters without actually dying- so it would create none of the ethical issues that come w dying (such as kill your gays) but it would distance him from the shadowhunters enough to let jordelia do their funky business.

matthew being stripped of his runes would explain why he isn’t on the family tree too, bc we know shadowhunters that were stripped of their runes aren’t allowed to have contact w their family.

i’ve talked about vampire matthew before but basically: there’s some hints at matthew staying young forever in chog, and him dying but becoming immortal instead would basically be pulling a jessamine. he dies, but doesn’t die.

becoming a vampire would also give us the Drama™ of his death scene, mayhaps some dramatic confessions, plus it would give him literal eternity to sort out his alcoholism/underlying issues (though i think that will be sorted out by the end of cot)

this also fixes the lack of love interest: if he’s immortal, that means we will probably see him again (maybe in twp/tec?) (with a hot vampire bf/gf, of course)

the only argument against this is again, that it would be too similar to tid, which we know cassie might be avoiding.

also perhaps that ppl might see it as as a way to execute the kill your gays trope without actually doing it, but then again, she sent haline to wranger island Just Like That so,,.,. she doesn’t seem to have any problems w that :^)

basically, i have no idea what’s gonna happen to matthew. i think downworlder matthew makes a Lot of sense, but at the same time it’s a bit of reach imo. if anything, i think it might make too much sense. (i had theories for tda that made a lot more sense than giant naked angels but We Got That Too, didn’t we!)

knowing cc’s writing, i think Matthew Suffers, But Somehow Lives is probably the route she will take. i just have no idea how it will be executed.

thank you for coming to my ted talk!

tl;dr: matthew’s death would be very convenient for some parts of the plot, but it would create a lot of issues with other parts of it. because of this, i think cc might take some sort of dying-but-not-really middle route.

* generally, because there’s a few exceptions: michael is bi but started out dead, which doesn’t count as killing people off imo. the faerie characters that died could be considered lgbt because technically all faeries are bi/pan, but none of the faeries that died ever had a same-sex romance. the aro/ace character that died in tmi is the only one i can think of, but he wasn’t explicitly aro-ace on page until the novellas that followed after tmi. matthew is very explicitly bisexual and has always been very explicitly bisexual.

[comicralph21]

Sorry for the late post but a huge THANK YOU goes out to the comedy fans in the 805 who came out to support #RalphFigueroaAndFriends last Friday on Cinco de Mayo at the Ventura Harbor CC! We had a packed house! What a crazy night too. One week later and we're still sharing crazy stories about that night. Damn you Trump. Lol! Truly one for the books. To Mo, Narcizo, Vic and Chueks, you guys were on fire. What a great show. A big shoutout to the homies @ricoandmambo @q959fm & @katisthis @live1055 for having me on to do morning radio with you guys. You guys rock. Thanks again 805, you guys were AWESOME, as always. See you guys real soon so stay tuned. Have a great weekend everyone. #LatePost #CincoDeMayo #VHCC #VenturaHarborComedyClub #Ventura #ComicRalph21 #HandsomeDevilComedy (at Ventura Harbor Comedy Club)

[itbeatsbookmarks]

(Via: Hacker News)

A Mind Is Born

Making a demo in just 256 bytes would be a formidable challenge regardless of platform. A Mind Is Born is my attempt to do it on the Commodore 64. In the absence of an actual 256-byte compo, it was submitted to the Oldskool 4K Intro compo at Revision 2017, where it ended up on 1st place.

VIDEO

Thanks to Lemming for the video capture!

Downloads

You can also find reactions to A Mind Is Born on pouët and csdb.

How it works

The remainder of this page is a tour of the inner workings of the demo. It is quite heavy on the technical side. Some familiarity with C64 programming is required to understand it fully, although as usual I will do my best to make it an interesting read also for non-experts.

Musical structure

The demo is driven by its soundtrack, so in order to understand what the program needs to do, it helps to have a schematic overview of the various parts of the song.

The three voices of the SID chip are used as follows: Voice 1 is responsible for the kick drum and bass, Voice 2 plays the melody and Voice 3 plays a drone that ducks on all beats, mimicking the genre-typical side-chain compression effect.

All in all, the song contains 64 bars in 4/4 time. It is played back at 112.5 bpm by means of a 60 Hz timer interrupt. The interrupt handler is primarily responsible for music playback, while the visuals are mostly generated in main conext.

Bar Bass pitch Melody waveform Additional effect $00��$07 Static note None None $08–$0f Static note Triangle Introductory "stuttering" melody $10–$17 Static note Triangle Normal melody, more colours on the screen $18–$1f Static note Sawtooth Normal melody $20–$27 Static note Hard-sync Broken/varied melody $28–$2e Static note Mixed Normal melody $2f Break Mixed Drum & bass are silenced $30–$37 Varied notes Mixed Drum & bass return, brighter graphics on the screen $38–$3e Varied notes Mixed Change in timbre for the drone $3f Varied notes Mixed Highpass filter, no blinking on the screen

When bar $40 is reached, the program turns off the display and jumps through the system reset vector. In this way, the final few moments of the demo are actually managed by the system boot sequence: First, the SID is silenced. Then, there is a delay while the system is setting up data structures. Finally, the display goes back on, and the C64 home screen is rendered. A mind is born.

Implementation

Now let's see how to do all of the above in 256 bytes. Here is a hex dump of the executable file:

Scaled-down hex dump for reference:

Let's start at the beginning. The first two bytes (yellow background) are the load address, $0801, in little-endian byte order. This is the default load address for a BASIC program, and was in fact mandated by compo rules.

Next up (cyan background) is the tiny BASIC program that bootstraps the demo. It looks like this when listed:

This line of BASIC is encoded in the file as follows: First there's a pointer ($080b) to the next line, or in this case to the end-of-program marker, which is a null pointer. Next up is the BASIC line number, which is 54271 for a good reason; more about this later. The byte $9e represents the SYS token, and is followed by a target address (2225) spelled out in PETSCII characters. A null-byte terminates the line.

The SYS statement invokes the initialisation routine (file offset $b3, blue background), which will be described in more detail later. Its main job is to copy the entire program into the zero-page and jump to it.

Following the BASIC program, with a slight overlap, is a shadow buffer for the SID registers (dotted black outline). Some of these values are modified while the demo is running, and all 25 bytes are copied into the SID register area, $d400–$d418, at the end of the interrupt handler. In addition, the five bytes starting at file offset $12 (brown background) represent the current palette. They are copied into the VIC background colour registers, $d020–$d024, also at the end of the interrupt handler.

The bytes at file offsets $14 and $21 (white and red digits, respectively) together form a 16-bit counter. This is the global clock of the demo. It is incremented by two at each interrupt. The low byte (white digits) represents the position within the current bar of music, while the upper byte (red digits) represents the current bar number, in the range $00–$40. Both bytes are located in the SID register shadow. In this way, the low byte automatically modulates the pulse-width of the melody vocie, while also animating one of the palette entries. The high byte controls the cutoff frequency of the SID filter, resulting in a slow filtersweep throughout the song.

The melody is generated by a linear-feedback shift register (LFSR). Thus, in one sense, the melody is randomly generated. But I spent a considerable amount of time tweaking the random process until I found something that was musically satisfactory. Tweakable parameters include the initial seed value, the so called "taps" of the LFSR, and most importantly the frequency table, which we will return to later. The LFSR is located at file offset $15 (blue digits). Note that the LFSR is initially zero, and this is why the melody is silent during the first eight bars of the song. The LFSR is also part of the palette, and additionally controls the upper bits of the pulse-width register for the melody voice, providing timbral variety.

The script (light green)

Starting at file offset $22 (light green background) is the script. This is essentially a poke table with eight entries, encoded as byte pairs. The first byte of each pair is the target address in zero-page, and the second byte is what to write. The writes are carried out during music playback, synchronised with the kick drums, and each entry remains in effect during eight bars of music.

Here is a rundown of what the entries in the script table do:

Bars Poke Effect $00–$07 ff 1f The first entry in the script, which overlaps the SID register shadow, is a dummy write to address $ff, just past the end of the program. This also means that SID register $d417 is $ff, meaning all voices (and the external input) are routed through the filter and the resonance is at maximum. $08–$0f 14 41 This initialises the melody LFSR. The seed value, $41, is written into the LFSR (at address $14) repeatedly during these eight bars, in time with the kick drums. This is what makes the melody stutter. $10–$17 d5 24 This entry overwrites an opcode in the main routine, enabling more colours on the screen. The main routine will be described in more detail later. What's more, since the script no longer keeps resetting the LFSR on every drum beat, the melody is allowed to proceed. $18–$1f 15 25 This selects waveform $25 for the melody voice, i.e. ring-modulated sawtooth. The ring-modulation bit doesn't affect the sawtooth waveform, so this sounds just like the more commonly used waveform $21. But recall that this byte also controls one of the colours in the palette: Colour 5 (green) adds some variety to the visuals at this point. $20–$27 15 53 The waveform is changed to $53, i.e. mixed waveform $51 with hard-sync. The hard-sync modifies the timbre of the sound, while also causing some notes to sound alike and other notes to disappear entirely, creating variety in the melody. Cyan (colour 3) also replaces green in the palette. $28–$2f 15 61 Here we select mixed waveform $61 for the melody voice. Hard-sync is now disabled, so we're back to the normal melody and colour 1 (white). $30–$37 d5 29 Here we write another opcode into the main routine, making the visual effect brighter. We'll come back to the visuals in the section about the main routine. $38–$3f 1b 0f This changes the high bits of the pulse-width of the drone voice from $e to $f, resulting in a noticeably brighter timbre.

As you can see, the script covers a large part of the register updates demanded by the song structure, but there is still a need for specialised branching code to handle the rest. That goes into the interrupt routine, which is the large block of code starting at offset $32 in the file (purple background). We'll dive into the assembler code of the interrupt handler in due time.

Initialisation (blue)

We will now have a closer look at the init code (file offset $b3, blue background), originally loaded at decimal address 2226. Actually, the SYS statement jumps to address 2225, but that's more or less for giggles: The interrupt routine happens to end with a jump into a ROM routine at address $ea7e, and this makes $ea the last byte of the interrupt handler. But $ea is the opcode for nop, so we might as well jump there.

Let's have a look at the code:

nop sei stx $286 stx $d021 jsr $e544 ldx #$fd initloop lda $802,x sta $02,x dex bne initloop stx $315 jmp $cc

Interrupts are temporarily disabled. The X register, which is known to be zero at this point, is written to two locations, selecting black as the current background colour. Different versions of the Kernal look for this in different places, hence the need to write twice. Next, a ROM routine for clearing the screen is called. We don't really care about clearing the screen buffer, but the point of calling the ROM routine is that it also fills the Colour RAM with our selected colour.

The entire program is then copied into the zero-page. The interrupt handler ends up at address $0031. The default Kernal interrupt handler, invoked via a vector at $0314, is at $ea31. Thus we only need to clear the high byte of the vector in order to divert it to our own handler. After doing that, we jump to the main routine (orange background), now in place at address $00cc.

The main routine (orange)

First, we select the ECM video mode (Extended Character Mode, where the two most significant bits of a character code determine what background colour to use). We also set YSCROLL to zero and select 24-line mode. This allows us to, at the end the demo, switch to a black screen with a single three-byte instruction (lsr $d011) without risking a VSP crash. Since the interrupt handler is called at 60 Hz, it would be dangerous to suddenly change YSCROLL, and keeping it at zero avoids that.

Interrupts are reenabled and we enter the main loop. One more thing needs to be initialised: We need to tell the VIC chip to look for the video matrix at address $0c00 and the font at $0000. This is done by writing $30 into the bank register ($d018). But this will be done from within the loop, as doing so allows us to use the value $30 for two things. An important property of this particular bank configuration is that the system stack page becomes part of the font definition.

The main loop is responsible for filling the stack with font data that varies in intensity with the volume of the drone voice, and also for filling the video matrix with ECM references that form interesting patterns on the screen.

mainloop lda $dc04 mod_op1 ldy #$c3 mod_op2 ora $d41c pha

It is relatively straightforward to generate the font bits: We grab the low byte of a CIA timer to obtain a randomish value. Then, at the label mod_op1, we optionally force some of the bits to one (this only happens after the opcode gets modified via the script). Then we bitwise-or with the output of the Voice 3 envelope generator. Recall that Voice 3 plays the drone, which is off-beat. Therefore, its envelope is zero when we want the visuals to be bright, and $ff when we want the visuals to be dark. But this is exactly what we get, due to having filled the Colour RAM with zeros. The resulting font bits are then pushed onto the cyclic stack.

Of course, every now and then as an interrupt is serviced, a few bytes in the stack area get overwritten, leading to visual glitches. But these glitches fit in with the other graphics, and actually provide a bit of variety, so that's fine.

Generating data for the video matrix is trickier, because we have to write to four different pages, and we have to try to create interesting large-scale shapes vertically as well as horizontally. Here is the code:

asr #$04 ldy #$30 sty $d018 ; Video matrix at $0c00, font at $0000. adc (vmptr),y inc vmptr adc (vmptr),y ror ora clock_msb ldy #$30+40 ora mod_op1 sta (vmptr),y bne mainloop ; Always branches.

The idea here is to maintain a pointer into the video matrix, and to read and combine two consecutive values (horizontal neighbours). The result is then written back 40 bytes later, i.e. directly below the second byte that was read. This results in some kind of poor man's cellular automaton. A little bit of randomness is also injected into the computation, based on what remains in the accumulator since the font generation. The high byte of the global clock also plays a role. The exact formula was determined through trial and error, and quite a lot of fiddling around was necessary before I found something that was interesting to look at.

Just before writing the computed value into the video matrix, we subject it to a bitwise-or with the opcode at mod_op1. This opcode (modified twice from the script) therefore serves dual purposes, as detailed below:

Opcode Instruction Effect on font Effect on video matrix a0 ldy #$c3 None Force background colour 2 or 3 (white/black, later white/red). 24 bit $c3 None Any colour allowed. 29 and #$c3 Force half of the pixels to be zero (i.e. not black), leading to brighter visuals. Any colour allowed.

In addition to the above, all three opcodes have bit 5 set, which ensures that only characters defined on the stack page get used.

Attentive readers will have noticed that only the low byte of the video matrix pointer gets incremented. The high byte is instead modified from within the interrupt handler, which we will get to presently. Naturally, this leads to a race condition, possibly resulting in visual glitches. But again, glitches fit in.

The video matrix pointer is located at $cb, corresponding to file offset $cc (solid black outline). Initially, it is $a900, resulting in some dummy writes to high memory.

The interrupt handler

Now we turn to the bulk of the code, which is the interrupt handler. First we increment the global clock:

inc clock inc clock bne noc1 inc clock_msb noc1

Then we ensure that the gate bit is set for the drone voice in the SID register shadow. Later, we'll decrement this byte if we're on a beat, which creates the desired ducking effect.

Next, we load the current song position (bar number) into both X and A, and take care of the special cases near the end of the song:

lax clock_msb cpx #$3f beq highpass bcc noend lsr $d011 jmp ($fffc) highpass ldy #$6d sty sid+$18 sty mod_op2 noend

To clarify, if we're past the end of the song we turn off the display and reset the system. If we're in the final bar, we switch to a highpass filter, and also modify the opcode at mod_op2. Thus, the value $6d is used both as a filter configuration byte and as an opcode (adc $xxxx). Looking back at the main routine, we find that the instruction at mod_op2 was responsible for blacking out the font bits based on the output from the drone envelope generator. Changing it to addition will essentially cancel that effect and stop the blinking.

Moving on, we still have the current bar number in both X and A. We use the value in A to compute the current byte offset into the script, and stash that away in Y for later use:

Generating the beat

Next up, we are going to compute the pitch of Voice 1, responsible for the kick drum and bass. This is rather complex. It mostly depends on where we are within the current beat, which is encoded in the lower six bits of the global clock.

If we are within the first 25% of a beat, we are going to generate a drum sound, i.e. a rapidly descending pitch. Ducking is also carried out during this part of the beat, even if the drums are currently muted (as they are in bar $2f). The following code takes care of both ducking and muting, as well as enforcing a static bass note during the first part of the song:

lda clock and #$30 bne noduck dec sid+2*7+4 noduck cpx #$2f beq bassoff bcs nointro ; During bars $00-$2e we keep playing the same bass ; note, from offset 2 in the bass table. ldx #2 nointro

If we are within the second 25% of a beat, we all but turn off Voice 1 by writing zero into the pitch high-byte. However, the pitch register is not fully cleared, because the LSB remains from the previous bass note. This creates a delicious low-frequency snarl during the gap between the drum and the bass.

; In second 25% of a beat? cmp #$10 beq bassoff

From X, we compute an index into the table of bass notes at file offset $f4 (green background):

To get the desired bass notes, we have to update both the LSB and MSB of the pitch register. But our pitch values do not exceed $3ff, so we can get away with a byte table if we put the MSB in the two least significant bits of the table entries. Having read a byte from the table, we first use it as the low-byte. Then we mask out the two least significant bits, and use the resulting value as the high-byte. This approach will detune the bass a little bit, but that's fine.

We perform the masking by means of a bitwise-and instruction (solid magenta outline) with the operand $00ab. The byte at absolute address $00ab is 3 (also shown with a solid magenta outline). In this way, we sneakily skip over the lax instruction (ab 00) that is executed when we branch to bassoff.

lda basstbl,x sta sid+0*7+0 .byt $2d ; and abs bassoff lax #0 ; Safe when the operand is zero. bcs bassdone ; Carry will be set if we ; got here via bassoff. ; Carry was not set by cmp #$10, so we are in the ; first 25% of a beat. Throw away the computed bass note ; and play a drum instead. ; But handle the script first. lax script+1,y ldx script,y sta 0,x lda clock asr #$0e ; A goes from 0 to 7 during the first 25% of the beat. ; Take this opportunity to update the video matrix pointer. tax sbx #256-8 stx vmptr+1 ; Invert the value to obtain the pitch of the drum sound. eor #$07 bassdone sta sid+0*7+1

Notice how the MSB of the video matrix pointer runs through the values $08–$0f as the drum pitch descends. Most of the memory in the C64 is uninitialised when our program starts. However, the program was originally loaded at address $0801, and this data effectively becomes the seed of the cellular automaton, leading to predictable visuals on every run. On the other hand, we want a certain amount of randomness to accumulate into the computation as it progresses towards higher memory addresses. This is why $0c00 is the ideal location for the video matrix.

Generating the melody

Now it is time to compute the pitch of Voice 2, i.e. the melody. If we are at the beginning of a new 16th note, we clock the LFSR and use the three least significant bits as an index into the melody note table at file offset $f8 (pink background). The first entry is zero, producing a rest.

The LFSR implementation is kind of backwards. Instead of shifting first, and exclusive-oring with a constant if a one was shifted out, we begin by loading the constant into the accumulator. Then we shift the LFSR and perform the exclusive-or, but we only write it back in case a one was shifted out. The point of doing it this way is that we can use the illegal sre instruction, and save one byte.

lda clock and #$0f bne nomel lda #$b8 sre mel_lfsr bcc noc2 sta mel_lfsr noc2 and #7 tax lda freqtbl,x sta sid+1*7+1 nomel

Next, we need to copy the SID register shadow into the actual SID registers, and the palette values into the corresponding VIC registers.

We begin with the VIC registers. While we only need to update registers $d020–$d024, we will actually go all the way down to $d01c. This allows us to reuse the two bytes at file offset $10 (beige background; also the ADSR values for Voice 1) as a base address.

ldy #8 vicloop lax sid+3,y sta (const_d01c),y dey bpl vicloop

A further side-effect of stopping at $d01c is that we end up with $19 in the accumulator (obtained from file offset $0e; this byte also controls the pulse-width of Voice 1). This is handy, because we can use it as the starting offset when looping over the SID registers:

tay loop lax sid-1,y sta (const_d3ff),y dey bne loop

Remember the trick we did near the bassoff label, where the operand of the and instruction would sometimes be interpreted as a lax instruction? The sta in the above code snippet is located at $aa, so because of the aforementioned trick its operand byte must be 3. Therefore, we have to ensure that the constant word $d3ff is stored at address $03, i.e. file offset $04 (solid blue outline). And that is why the BASIC line number is 54271 ($d3ff).

Finally, we leave the interrupt routine by jumping into ROM:

This will acknowledge the timer interrupt, restore the registers, and return to main context.

And that's all there is to it, really.

Posted Thursday 20-Apr-2017 08:13

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Anonymous Thu 20-Apr-2017 11:14

In initloop, use sta $0002,x and skip ldx #$fd to save a byte? - ninjadrm

lft Linus Åkesson Thu 20-Apr-2017 11:33

In initloop, use sta $0002,x and skip ldx #$fd to save a byte? - ninjadrm

If X is known to be zero in all Kernal versions, then sure. And I know of at least two more bytes that can be saved.

Anonymous Thu 20-Apr-2017 13:14

Damn it, Linus, you are a god damn genius. Keep doing this kind of stuff. An anonymous admirer.

Anonymous Thu 20-Apr-2017 16:38

lft wrote:

If X is known to be zero in all Kernal versions, then sure. And I know of at least two more bytes that can be saved.

Oops, I somehow missed the call to $e544. Shame on me. But actually, that's even better, it returns X=$01 on all kernel versions I tried, so you could use sta $02-1,x even.

And thanks for the fun stuff to read, of course!

Anonymous Fri 21-Apr-2017 00:35

This demo is not just technically impressive but I found also evocative of thought and emotion. This isn't just a programming triumph, but an artistic one. The program itself, at 256 bytes, is little more than a "seed" from which the demo (and the Mind) blossoms from. It's so small that the actual execution in memory takes up more space, and watching it play out on YouTube takes up orders of magnitude more; how many dozens of gigabytes were transmitted by all the people who've watched videos of this demo? But what about what we actually see and hear? The visuals start off as Sierpinski triangles, symbolic of both the endless, seemingly-chaotic nature of fractals as well as their order. As the song plays, the fractals become morphed into other shapes. Lines, sharp corners, and occasionally blobs show up, evoking in me images of wrinkles in brains or circuit patterns. The melody is randomly generated but backed by a simple, steady bass rhythm, a similar marriage of chaos and order. The song's climax (at 1:42 in the video) impresses upon me a march of progress as the Mind finally takes shape, formed from random matter and energy and into an entity. We observe the formation of the Mind from the ether not just visually and aurally, but also in the form of the 256-byte seed expanding into the demo flower, eventually taking shape as the C64's home screen.

[peanutbutterandbananasandwichs]

Heyyyyyy happy to report I am still alive! Autograph achieved and he remembered me and my question from yesterday and thanked me for it 😭😭😭

[peanutbutterandbananasandwichs]

Ok, I'm alive (barely) so Jared question storytime !

So I'm including this as context because it's why I feel a little 😧 about the answer he ended up giving (not in a bad way just like I was a little shocked re his answer).

So the person 2 questions before me (I think they were the 2nd question overall) asked a REALLY inappropriate question to both of them that was "which of your childhood traumas left the deepest scar" which I'm sure you can imagine pretty much everyone in the hall was little jesus christ when they heard that. Anyways Jared and Misha handled it very well, much better than I ever could, but for obvious reasons basically didn't answer the question.

THEN they started screening questions beforehand and I was like 😬 idk if I can ask mine now but I can't think on my feet enough to ask a different one and I assured the steward that I was asking purely about Jared's acting approach.

Anyways so I went and asked my question, I did slip in a kinda jokey apology that I didn't know someone would ask that right before me lol.

So I started my question by saying how wonderful his portrayal of Sam as a trauma survivor was and I thanked him for how much care he put into it and said it was very important to me and to so many people and then just said thank you again.

And I barely remember what he looked like what I was speaking during this bit because I was blacking out hahaha but I'm 90% certain he did that really sweet sincere face and clutched his hands over his heart and ahfgchfghbb.

Anyways then I asked him specifically about how when Sam flinches at sudden noises/violence he often looks embarrassed/ashamed about his reaction and I said that obviously he shouldn't have to feel that way but that it rang very true to life/to Sam in specific. And I asked if that was something that was in the script or if it was something he thought was how Sam would react/was that something he'd intentionally brought to his portrayal of Sam's trauma.

And he said it was a great question. And was like yes, it was absolutely intentional, and I think he said a little bit about his thought behind it which I do not remember cause again, blacking out, lmao.

Anyways, then he kinda referenced the terrible childhood trauma question, and then said that when he was a kid there was a drive-by shooting outside of his house, and that even though everyone in his family was ok it had really affected him, and that he was hyper vigilant, super reactive to noise, really jumpy etc and had had to have therapy to help with it. And basically kinda said that he'd used that a bit with Sam.

And he thanked me for the question again and for sharing that that aspect of Sam was important to me.

So yeah I was a bit like idk if he would have gone that direction if the other question hadn't been asked and it made me feel a little bit like oh I hope he didn't think I expected him to give such a personal answer. But on the other hand he didn't answer that other question, but then did tell that story in answer to my question so I have to assume that my question made him feel more comfortable than the previous one did.

[peanutbutterandbananasandwichs]

Question about quirks picked up from their characters. Jared said it was very hard to know what he'd picked up from Sam and what Sam got from him. But then said that he does find himself saying "So get this" a lot and then immediately being like SHIT haha. He said he ends up saying it a lot when telling his kids stories.

[peanutbutterandbananasandwichs]

Mark and Ruth's panel was also a delight btw I love them