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lilylilym · 3 years

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Cinematic language to help you understand why Levihan is more canon than you think

First thing first, of course the plane was Hange. And the wood parallel is deeper than just hints of canon ship

If the birb is Eren then the plane is Hange. It’s called a ✨symbol✨ and a ✨parallel✨ , a narrative device and a visual cue means for readers to reflect on

a) things that happened related to the actual object (when have we seen this before and last time we see it what happened)

b) what it could represent in terms of symbolic meaning (travel, migration, meaning mobility and freedom and civilization and means and that Levi has a good life for example)

c) how it is positioned in relationships with other object/symbol that are similar to it visually, to draw some similarities and differences in terms of narrative (plane is a machine birb, scientific birb, Levi sees plane while Mikasa hanging out w birb, what do this mean???? Thinkkkkkk)

Some folks will find value in learning comp lit, to know how to read narrative work, including cinema. AOT is visual but it is also deeply cinematic in the way Hajime Isayama draws the panel and the variety of shots he uses to depict the passive narration such as voice-over, time-lapse, flashbacks, time jump, etc.

Here’s an example of how AOT is structured by paralllels, symbols, and narrative devices through editing/cinematic techniques to tell the story. This is my favorite scene when Isayama uses a combination of cutaway and montage to use a character’s dialogue beyond the immediate moment (real time) to depict a larger theme of the story:

This scene is Levi and Kenny talking to each other in real time. There are many ways to depict a dialogue. If it is about each other, then characters are usually depict in “continuity editing” where the whole scene is about them talking to each other, shots will be opposite shots of their face, over-the-shoulder, giving audiences a feel that you are there with them in the convo, listening to them talk. But this scene “cutaway” in that it breaks up the “linear time” by showing audiences other images not realistically been seen by any character, to broaden the scope of the scene. Now you know it’s not just about the dialogue. However, cutaway usually is a thing that realistically in that scene, like cut to the tree while Kenny is still speaking, then go back to them.

In this “sequence,” what is shown is a montage of images that are not only “flashbacks” (memory of things the characters have seen/witnessed, since he couldn't have seen Kuchel) but compilation of new images that are “symbolic” to the lines Kenny is speaking. In other words, the author is drawing “parallels” from one instances to others, connecting separated people, scenes, stories, actions, decisions into one larger thing we call “theme”––Isayama’s making sure that audiences know exactly what to think by forcing separated images into one montage, and make sure you understand that this message needs to be understood beyond Kenny. So that’s the cinematic language readers should be aware that Isayama is using.

That’s why arguing events based on literal evidence is limited, because it is cannon itself that events, stories, people’s decisions and investments are meant to be interpreted and understood in juxtaposition.

Now let’s move on to juxtapositions and parallel in Levihan and Eremika:

I know people have use the wood parallel to talk about how Levihan is canon, but I think the wood is meant to show that Levihan are the adult version of Eremika, who also understand and rely on each other, but a lot more secured in their relationship and trust.

So, get this: for Eremika, Eren had to ask who he is to Mikasa (I know, dumbo) before they get the alternative living in the wood. That’s cuz their young love is shy and also full of insecurities and they are unsure of how to understand their affection for one another. The insecurity is especially pronounced when Mikasa, after having been asked that (”who am I to you”), still get so hurt when Eren said he had been hating her since they were kids. That means we can read that she took the question as “what do you want from me why are you clingy” instead of “pls tell me you like me.”

In another world, she is her fierce self who lives only for her and Eren (like she used to back then, ready to fight the whole army to keep Eren alive but now she’s a soldier for humanity) and suggested that they runaway to live in the wood. In this scenario, Mikasa’s suggestion was implied, we never saw her do it, only told in Eren’s retelling, and even so, in his words (“thats what you said, Mikasa”).

This whole scene is continuity editing with flashbacks, purely from the perspective of Mikasa. You as the reader assumes her point of view, because the images depict Eren speaking, and Eren’s words dictate most of the information. So you, as a reader, is being told to, passively that this is what happened, and that whatever decision of how they get here, has been made prior to you. In other words, while the dialogue happening about them being together is real time, the dialogue of how they decided to do so, is not. That is meant for interpretation. The author does not let you know how it happened in real time. This intended foreclosing is meant to evoke a sense of confusion, unsatisfaction (because you do not get to know how decisions are made and why), so it is safe to assume that the intended feeling is also just that--bittersweet. You know the couple get to be together, but they were not entirely at peace. This life will weight heavily on them until the day Eren dies. This scene is in chapter 138, but in story’s time, it’s meant to be continue before the timeskip.

For Levihan, in chapter 126, the conversation between Levihan was playing out in real time itself, but the whole scene is an independent moment that preceded the real event (which was continued on from chapter 125, where Hange and Levi met with Pieck and Theo).

In this scene, readers can see that the suggestion was direct, and we were in on the act as it happens. Hange thought Levi was unconscious, so they were thinking out loud. “Maybe we should just live here together, right, Levi?” We see Hange contemplating about it, said it out loud, and sad that it might just be a wild thought.

Time cut. Now they’re doing something else, before the path appears, and they turned around to wake Levi up. Levi woke up at that same moment, immediately asking about what happened before he was unconscious, not letting Hange know that he heard the whole thing. He took time to catch up with what happened, gathering information and providing information. This means he is contemplating about Hange’s proposal.

“I let him get away again.” Hange responded to this sentence with “I’m sure you want revenge, but for now...” Levi moved on, seamlessly, without a beat, “If we keep running and hiding, what will that get us?” At first it seems like a continuation of the convo--as in Levi doesn’t want to keep hiding and want to go back to battle, but Hange understood immediately that he was referring to their talk: “So you heard me talking to myself.”

Here, Hange weren’t like “omg im sorry I didn’t know u were up i would have never,” because that would suggest that the relationship between them is unconfirmed and that Hange has yet to know what Levi thinks of them (as seen in Eremika’s nature of their relationship). But they were just like, ok, so you heard. Then Levi saw that Hange was making a thing to carry him, and concluded, “I know you. You’re not able to stay out of the action.” Hange admitted, “Yeah, that’s right, I can’t.”

If you look at the scene itself, you will see a lot of opposite shots (POV of the two characters who are talking to each other), many of them are close-up (right in their face). It is a short, but continuous, linear conversation where Hange and Levi got to talk about the possibility, discussed it together, before Levi pointed out that Hange could never just sit this one out, and Hange agreed. This scene is also meant for interpretation, because even though they talked about the possibility, they didn’t go “so what do you think, I think we should” but it was Hange’s wild thought that they fully intended not to go through, and Levi’s understanding that he was not meant to truly respond, because he saw that Hange already had a plan to keep it moving. (The next scene is Levi negotiating with Theo and Pieck, so it’s safe to assume that they spent the rest of their conversation discussing strategies.)

Levihan’s scene is short, but it was meant to read in juxtaposition with Eremika’s more elaborate life in the wood in 138 -- communicating the idea that if they had run away together, they would also suffer intensely survivor’s guilt. Which, as soldiers and commanders, they simply cannot choose. So, in a way, this is to depict Levi’s theme, “no regret,” even as they never had a future to be together at peace. The fact that they can have this extremely heavy conversation means that there were peaceful moments between them that they experienced, that would allow this scene to read like a final good bye.

So, as I have rambled more than I needed to, I’mma stop here. My point was pretty simple and meant to invite folks to read AOT very generously in terms of its couple/romantic/partnership, in that just because things are not fleshed out doesn’t mean it’s not real and that readers are supposed to read between the line, thematically, across storylines to get the full picture, but sternly in the way that you need to understand narrative devices and visual cues the ways they’re meant to be read. To go back to the plane controversy (apparently some people insist that planes are planes), of course planes are planes, that’s what they first and foremost need to be. No object would be included for the symbolic meaning only - it always need to be itself first and foremost, to create a normative sense of reality before it could go imaginative and interpretive.

#snk #aot #levihan #eremika #levi ackerman #hange zöe #kenny ackerman

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herglowinggirl · 2 years

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would you be willing to elaborate on your yun and lek tags on that post about characters who haven’t met bc I’m curious

yes I would be despite my tags askdlfjlasd

yun and lek are not characters as individuals themselves, they also serve as concepts and as foils to kyoshi and other characters and that includes each other through their relationship to kyoshi!

like for instance in this post I pointed out the parallels to their deaths. obviously the fact that they're both killed at jianzhu's hands is an important factor. they're both bending prodigies (by necessity, which I'll talk about later). but also their relationship to water in their Origin Stories and also their origin stories themselves!

now I'd likely be more able to elaborate after a re-read, but. water obviously serves a very important purpose in the kyoshi novels, between kyoshi's discomfort with bending it (her chafing under the legacy of kuruk's own prodigious bending and actions as avatar) and it being what kyoshi uses to kill yun. it's not a mistake that when she hears kuruk's voice it's near bodies of water: it was near a meditative pool the first time in trok I think!! and then in order to learn the truth and truly talk to kuruk she has to immerse herself in water (I do love good baptism/water as truth/water as life imagery thank you very much) like whew what a way to also tie it back to aang, last of his culture, being preserved in ice! there's a good meta about water as a motif in the kyoshi novels (not mine) sitting around here somewhere but I don't know who wrote it or where to find it!! but!! when I do i'll rb it

yun's origin story when he was re-made didn't directly come after his fight. it came after he was denied water and then finally snapped. lek's origin story is that he came from a town that dried up, where water was hard to come by. I've said and elaborated on it before, but yun wasn't meant to survive. neither was lek. I think not only is it important that yun's line "i'll be glad if it's you" is echoed by kyoshi, but also the role kyoshi plays in both relationships. had yun not been picked up by jianzhu, he likely wouldn't have made it farther than street urchin. had lek not been picked up by kyoshi's parents, he would've died with the rest of his town. in this way, yun is like a eviler lek. because lek had his brother that he lost, that he failed, and was granted a place in a family, and yun has failed the entire world, has been cast out, and now finds no place for himself. what kyoshi finds in a family yun completely looses.

right, but anyway, lek and yun are saved by filling kyoshi's spot. so not only were they "supposed" to die both times, they then are killed by kyoshi's recentering of the narrative meant to fit her. yun is thought dead by kyoshi, and lek almost dies via anaphylaxis bc of his sting. then they actually die! but also they have the "deaths" from pre-canon. there is not a moment in this narrative where these two aren't dead, basically, except for the profound effect they have on kyoshi. even tagaka recognizes that yun is no avatar, when everybody was so happy to have a competent and charming dude. he doesn't struggle, at least in the way an avatar should, to prevent the corruption of the position.

and these deaths are jianzhu-induced, obviously, but they also give jianzhu what he wanted: an avatar. so he was effective, basically. it makes me want to chew glass.

also, like, this effects yun and lek's bending. both of these two learned to bend out of necessity. so did kyoshi, obviously, but in the role she plays while letting yun and lek fill her narrative, she doesn't have to learn to bend. it suites her not to, actually, because it causes her trouble and further alienates her as a servant girl. that's why the confrontation with tagaka is such a powerful inciting incident: it forces her to pick up power and responsibility entirely, including of her bending. and when she does learn to bend, it's under teachers, whereas yun has innate natural talent and lek has sworn never to miss another shot.

there are differences. but I think the relationships they have with kyoshi (besties, brotherly, even if yun was a romantic interest for a sec, but i could refute that) is their greatest common factor and it's why I sometimes wonder what they could've been like if they'd met. if they could've lived for a moment. their entire thing is not meeting, because they showcase the same fate. what’s the point! they’re bound by kyoshi. yun’s slightly more of an individual. but i think they would’ve been bros. i think when kyoshi thinks of yun when she sees lek bend...that drives me nuts! what they could’ve shared! how they could’ve healed! but alas. the narrative is hungry.

#z.txt #zey herglowinggirl? answering an ask? unheard of.

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annalyticall · 2 years

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Thoughts on Dragon Age: Origins

Other Dragon Age Thoughts: Dragon Age 2 Part 1 | Dragon Age 2 Part 2 | Dragon Age Inquisition

Ok now that I've finished Dragon Age: Origins and two main DLCS Witch Hunt and Awakening, I can finally put together my thoughts on it all.

First off, some context. I had never played a Dragon Age game before but I have played Skyrim extensively and some WoW, so I was at least somewhat familiar with the way the genre works. I have a base understanding of D&D which helped me a little with things like skills and attributes and general RPG staples.

After bumbling around as a Dalish elf rogue for a few hours and getting to know the rules of the world, I landed on my final character: Pallas Surana, an elf mage from the Circle. I get incredibly into character building so my goal with her was to create a phoenix-themed character that would help the citizens of Ferelden start anew in the midst of the Blight. To keep in theme, I mainly used healing and fire spells.

Personality-wise I played (unintentionally) naive early in the game, had a turning point around the Urn of Sacred Ashes, and was more forgiving and thoughtful in my encounters afterward. My main companions were Leliana, Wynne, and Alistair. Major decisions include: siding with the Mages, siding with Lord Harrowmont, helping the Dalish keeper break the werewolf curse peacefully, destroying the Lost Anvil, letting Jowan help and sparing his life, saving Connor without blood magic, letting Alistair execute Loghain, promoting Queen Anora to the throne, romancing Alistair, accepting the Dark Ritual, and asking for the independence of the Circle. I ended up together with Alistair as Grey Wardens.

With all that out of the way, I've listed the things I liked and didn't like from this game:

The Good

The impact of the player on storylines. I've always been a fan of player-tailored story games, and this delivered more variation than I was expecting from a game its age. Looking up all the ways certain situations could play out was amazing to me, I'm incredibly impressed.

Character customization and origin. I loved the origin prologue stories, and although I only know the Dalish and the mage ones so far, I'm sure the others were just as rich and varied. They really gave context and life to random NPCs - I know I wouldn't have cared about Jowan as much if I stayed playing my Dalish elf. In the same vein, I liked how my class race and gender actually impacted my experience in the world. In Skyrim you might get a throwaway line from an NPC if you're playing an elf or khajit or mage and that's it. In this game there are things you straight up can't do if you're a certain class or race or gender and I like the immersion that brings.

The romances. Alistair my beloved, that rose scene was so precious it melted my heart. But it wasn't just Alistair - while I didn't pursue a relationship with Leliana or Zevran, I definitely would have had it not been for other options. They're so charming and lively, it's hard not to like any of them.

(Almost) all the companions. I'll elaborate more on who I'm leaving out but everyone else was a treasure. I wasn't expecting to like Morrigan, Wynne, and Shale so much, but they each had their own compelling narratives and personalities that made me want to spend more time around them.

Voice acting. Probably hand-in-hand with companion personalities were their voice actors but especially those of Alistair and Morrigan, they were the stars of the show.

Humor. This game is funny. Any game that is able to make me laugh in the midst of its dark subject matter without completely losing the balance of tone earns my respect.

The moral decisions. This is what I'm about. Perhaps my favorite moral quandary was the werewolf/Dalish elf war. These kinds of decisions shape not only my player character but also who I decide to be as a player.

Worldbuilding. I really like the world of Dragon Age. It was cool to see what it looked like from different vantage points depending on what your origin was, though I will say the Dalish origin is not especially newbie-friendly since the Dalish by design don't know a lot of lore. The Circle Tower was much better at introducing me to mechanics of the world, such as phylacteries and chantries and templars. I think I'll keep playing mages because their conflict with the chantry is the most interesting to me.

The Bad

Orzammar, Oghren, and the Deep Roads. I'll be blunt - I have never been able to like Dwarven lore or characters in any fantasy setting and at this point I don't think I ever will. I hated Blackreach in Skyrim but the Deep Roads have got it beat. Oghren, the companion I left out of what I liked about the game, was barely tolerable. He had some good moments here or there but most of the time I found him crude and annoying. Unfortunately, I did not give a shit about anything that happened in Orzammar including who I made king, I only liked the magic-obsessed teenager Dagna and her side quest.

Lack of unique romance and friendship dialogue late game. This might just be a problem of my own making since I was so endeared by Alistair at the start of the game that I might have exhausted all of his romance dialogue before I reached Orzammar. For me, that meant that the section of the game that was already dull to me was made even duller by only getting default lines by Alistair and company. I would have liked it if there were ways to get more unique lines to trigger at later stages of the game.

Sex scenes. Not that I wanted to watch them in the first place but the dated graphics just don't make them appealing in the slightest anyway. I only had to endure two of them thankfully but even when playing by myself I found each one super awkward to sit through, especially the one between Alistair and Morrigan. There weren't many times when I thought the game favored a male player over a female player, but that was one of them. I know that scene was probably made for the male player character in mind and not a female-romanced Alistair, because he felt copy-and-pasted in there both visually and narratively.

Combat. I have never been a fan of that mmorpg style of combat as seen in WoW, and I wasn't a fan of it here either. Tactics was a nice option to have but was often clunky to implement. I much rather spend my combat time in first-person ala Skyrim. I decided to put it on easy mode to skip by most combat fast and get to the good part aka story and dialogue.

Lack of variety in mage clothes. A nitpick really, but in the late game it seems like the only viable mage outfit was the one with the weird collar and feathery shoulder pads and if you don't like it too bad. You can't even change the color! Warriors got all the cool gear what's up with that.

The DLC

Witch Hunt. Kinda felt like a waste of time, thankfully it didn't take that much time anyways. I wasn't particularly attached to the one-off companions, but they were fine. This DLC was cool to play as a mage though, and having played the Dalish origin I recognized the mirror in the ruins too, which was neat. The highlight by far was getting to talk to Morrigan one last time. I really don't know why there were so many options to tell her she betrayed me and that I would kill her though. She never betrayed me? She was pretty upfront about her intentions I thought. Thankfully I avoided all of that and had a nice parting with her as friends.

Awakening. This was a pretty worthwhile DLC, there was a lot more content than I was expecting. This DLC was also pretty heavy on moral decisions too which I loved. I found all of the new companions endearing with the exception of Oghren who I somehow got along with even worse than I did in the main game. Anders was fun, I'm excited to see him again in DA2. I also really loved Justice, it took me no time at all to max out his approval rating. With the upgraded skills and talents I found combat to be a little more enjoyable than before. I liked feeling experienced too, the story and gameplay convinced me that my warden really was worthy of being a commander. Playing this DLC did make me somehow nostalgic for the base game though, I missed Alistair but I was glad he was mentioned in the epilogue.

So overall I really loved playing this game, despite the few places I found it lacking. I'm definitely invested and I'm excited to keep playing through the next two games, and now that I know the basic lore, I can focus on building a cohesive narrative between my player characters.

#long post #anna plays dragon age #one down two to go

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gb-patch · 3 years

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Ask Answers (March 3rd, 2021)

Here’s our latest batch of anon ask answers! Thanks for waiting for them.

Will there be a 'Our Life' game for each season? Please say we're getting a winter one!

As of right now we’re only planning on making two, summer and fall. They take quite a while to finish and we’re not sure where we’ll be when the second OL is truly wrapped up. But it’s not impossible we can do a third. Though, four Our Life games is probably not super likely, honestly, aha. Maybe the third game, if we make one, could be switch between winter and spring or something.

What engine/engines do you use to make your games?

We use Renpy for all our projects!

For version 1.2 of OL, did you make any changes to the DLC? If so, could you post a changelog detailing what exactly (or at least a general overview)? If it's not too much trouble, could you also elaborate on the bugs/errors you fixed in the base game?

There aren’t really any changes to the DLCs, except for the voiced name DLC getting an expansion. We fixed very few small typos and added a couple extra lines. Unfortunately, we don’t have a list of exactly what all the little fixes were.

I've been playing OL and I love the characters! As soon as Baxter showed up, I knew I wanted to learn more about him! Would you consider adding him as a prospective LI in the future?

Yep, Baxter (and Derek) will be getting his own romance story as an optional DLC late in 2021! Glad you like him.

Hellooo! First off I'm a huge fan of the game and can't stop playing it. However, I was wondering about how much domestic life with Cove we'll get to see in step 4. Meaning the time before the wedding and the time after. In my game Cove and I talked about having children and I was hoping that would be an option in step 4. Either way, I cannot wait for the release and I send my best to everyone working on the production :) thanks!

I’m sorry, there’s no children or scenes after the two are married. There’s sort of endless possibilities for what that future could be like, so we unfortunately can’t depict it. You only get scenes before they’re married and, if you get the wedding DLC, you can see the day they get married. It ends there, though. But thank you for the well-wishes!

Hello! I was just wondering, so step 4 is going to be similiar to the prologue/epilogue scenes of the game. Is the Wedding DLC going to be one long scene too or will that have moments? (I love the game by the way, its ruined all other visual novels for me in the most wonderful way <3 )

Yeah, Step 4 and the wedding DLC will be like the prologues/summer ended parts of the game. There won’t be separate Moments you can play in any order. I’m really happy you like the game so much!

You said that the OL MC's birthday can't be in summer, but what if you headcanoned it to be?

You can headcanon it as being in summer! There just aren’t birthday events in the game even if you do know your MC was born in summer. We had to leave those out, since some people might not want their MC to be born in summer and then they’d miss out on extra birthday scenes because of it. It wouldn’t have been fair.

Hello!😺 I absolutely love your game!😻 I can't wait for DLS with Derek and Baxter. And I wonder if Baxter could have seen Cove and MC at the party during their first failed dance? Or is Baxter only paying attention to who he's dancing with, or is he not dancing with anyone at the soiree at all then?

Baxter isn’t really paying attention to the couples on the floor. He’s just cruising the outskirts for someone available to dance with him. So he doesn’t get any memories of the MC or Cove at that party if the two just dance with each other. It’s great to hear you like the game!

time-wise/step-wise when does the nsfw dlc take place?

It’s not super strict in terms of an exact of weeks/months, but generally it’s sometime not long after the end of Step 3.

Heya! I'm currently obsessed with Our Life (I played through the entire game on Valentine's Day, hahaha– ha... hah), and I have one silly question: if I start playing Step 3 with the less... "romantically inclined" interest levels (Fond & Disinterest), is there still a chance of getting a romantic ending with Cove? Can Cove and the MC realize "they're the one for me" in just one summer? Or... are confessions off the table completely unless at least at Crush level? Thank you in advance!

So happy you’re having fun with it! In OL1 deciding that Cove is your friend means he’s truly only a friend. You can’t decide you have a crush partway through. But we are considering doing things differently in future games.

hey i have some questions about our life

a) is there a way to be friends with that mean bowlcut kid or is he always... like tha

b. what is coves ethnicity?

A. He is always like that, haha. At least as a kid, he does grow up to be different~

B. Cove’s mom Kyra is white, but Cliff’s race doesn’t come up and players are able to headcanon it. So Cove is half white and half whatever you prefer Cliff to be.

how do you get to the two mc cut-in scenes from the new update?

Hiii! I'm doing another playthrough (it's only like my 100th time playing through the entire game) after the 1.2 update, and I was wondering how to get the new art? I also really love all the new stuff, thank you for working so hard and creating such a wonderful game :)

You can check our our CG guide on Steam for that! Thank you for the kind words.

Sorry to bother you, but I have a question about the Patreon moment. Will there be initiative settings there too? And if there aren't, will the MC lead the whole thing or will Cove lead at certain points too? Thank you~

There will still be flexibly in what you’re comfortable with and whether you want Cove to automatically do things or for choices to always be involved :]. And you don’t need to apologize!

Hello!! I wanted to ask a couple of questions about Our Life:

1. Will we able to buy all the DLC via Steam or will there be some of them only available in Patreon? Just to know if I should create a Patreon user XD

2. Will Our Life: Now and Forever be about the current MC, Cove and the other characters or will it be a game with a New MC, new romantic options and new characters?

1. There will be a Patreon-only NSFW bonus Moment. But all the normal planned DLCs will release on Steam.

2. Our Life: Now & Forever is about new characters- new MC, new family, new LI, etc.

just some small bug I noticed: even if you didn't ask Cove to dance, if he asks you at the Soiree in Step 2 later and you say yes to dancing, the MC acts like they got to dance with Cove again even if it was the first time.

Thank you for the report on that! We thought it was fixed, but I guess it didn’t work.

I was messing around with the new update and I noticed that all the hands in the firefly CGs have the same skin tone regardless of what you put in, (with the exception of the really dark skin color) is this a glitch or something?

The skin tones aren’t the same. It’s just because they’re out at night with only fireflies for light that it makes each image look dark and therefore similar. But if you line them up together it’s clear how there are changes in every option.

How long did it take to plan out and write the story for OL? Not including the programming, art stuff, or the DLC chapters, I mean just planning and writing the base game story alone. The base game story seems hefty as is, and then on top of that there's the changes to scenes depending on MC's and Cove's personalities and relationship, I'm curious how long that took

It took basically the full development time, aha. I’m someone who doesn’t fully outline a project before start and instead continues to come up with stuff as a project progresses. There were new parts to the story being created right up to near the launch. So, starting in 2016 or so to later 2020, with some breaks/hold-ups throughout that time.

Hello! I'm really, really enjoying Our Life: Beginning and Always, it was the kind of sweet, wholesome content I needed during these past months. I had a quick question, will you be making any female characters for the MC to romance? In this game or any others like it? I'm a lesbian and I'd love to have a female love interest with such well written romance as yours! Thank you so much.

Thank you for the nice comment! Our Life: Beginnings & Always won’t have a female LI since we didn’t want to treat other gender options as second fiddle to the male lead. But we have just started full production on Our Life: Now & Forever, which will have a starring female LI! There’s a silhouette glimpse of her Step 1 self here~

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Thanks everyone for sending the questions :D

FAQ If you prefer to just see the main posts without all the asks/reblogs, feel free to follow our side account instead: GB Patch Updates Bl

#our life #Our Life Beginnings & Always #ask #gb patch #gb patch games #long post #Our Life: Now & Forever

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seerofmike · 3 years

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The Paquette Problem

i got some help from @deepspacezombie , who thinks about wattson Much More than I do, and had Many Things to say. thank you zombie!!!!!!

this post comes after reading the new overtime comic, and it finally clicking in my brain the problem that I have with Wattson's character and the way the writers treat Wattson. It's a bit long, so I'll include it under the cut.

Okay, so. Just so we're clear, right off the bat: I fucking hate the term "Mary Sue". I think 80% of the time, its application is sexist and given to female characters who you KNOW would get a complete pass if they were male. Also, Mary Sues are typically defined by being flawless author-inserts, but Wattson lacks the 'self-insert' part (as far as I know). Still, though. I do fully believe that Wattson is a Mary Sue...or at least, a character who is not allowed to have flaws.

"But she does," you could argue. "She's awkward and doesn't 'get' people. Also she's autistic."

Okay, first of all, autism isn't a character flaw. Yes, I've legitamately seen that be argued. Secondly...that's not what we're shown? Yes, those are voice-lines in-game, but everything else we've been shown is contrary to this. Everyone views her as a 'kid sister', and she seems to get on with them all just fine and goes as far as to call them her family.

She's the 'cute' character whom everyone likes. Her autism is only shown when it's convenient and often as cute character quirks. "They only show her autistic traits in ways that are "cutesy", esp w her stimming and supposedly being awkward/clumsy. It's far more endearing than it is anything else." -- ( direct quote from @deepspacezombie , who is also autistic.)

The only time she has not been shown to "get" someone or get along with them instantly (aside from Revenant), is Rampart, whom she calls rude and says that she does not get her humor. Overtime comic #3, however, flips this around, and has Wattson telling Rampart to "stop putting up walls", a strange comment that's not elaborated on. There have been theories floating around that Rampart has anxiety, and this could possibly be what she's referring to. But it's a flip of their dynamic. Rampart was a person that Wattson does not 'get', but now, she does.

Her character is inconsistent in this regard: we're told one thing but shown another.

Crypto trusts her despite being affiliated with the Syndicate, and gives no reason beyond "you seemed trustworthy". Caustic takes on a 'paternal' role towards her because her brain is just So Huge, my dude. (he seeks out a science buddy status with horizon, but that goes nowhere). he's 'overprotective' of her and his actions towards crypto have been likened to a father not liking his daughter's boyfriend, to the point that that's what a lot of their dialogue sounds like. they fight over her.

She gets hurt in TBG and it's treated as this huge, earth-shattering event, with Caustic choking Loba out, Wraith rushing her and Octane to be by her side, dramatic cliffhanger, everyone upset over it, protective of her when Revenant comes, etc. Even Octane, who apparently was close to none of the Legends at this point in time, gets mad.

Speaking of him: a similar thing happens to Octane and it's glossed over. He's fine in the immediate next chapter. This can be chalked up to being "typical behavior" for Octane, but it was mentioned that he had lost a lot of blood. The story seems far less concerned with him, however. Again, this can be attributed to different things, but it's just worth putting here.

Also, the Syndicate and Blisk have a soft spot for her, and she's been stated to be The One Who Can Bring Everyone Together. Just as the cherry on top.

Now, that's maybe not enough to be a Mary Sue in the eyes of people. Like, some people are just inherently magnetic and likeable. she sure does have a huge amount of fans and people who play her despite her being broken and Not Fun to play half the time--but this is where The Conflict(tm) comes in.

I'm gonna lay everything out very quickly and simply:

-Caustic frames Crypto for betraying them. Crypto says no, it was Caustic, actually. Wattson, who doesn't know who to trust, runs away.

--Gibraltar finds out the truth. In a loading screen for season 6, says that he tried to tell her what happened, but she refused point blank to hear him out.

--crypto spends all of season 6 begging for her forgiveness (despite having done nothing wrong) and asking for her to let him tell the truth. wattson calls him a traitor and tells caustic that she can take care of herself. this is framed in-story and by one of the writers as her Taking A Stand, Being Strong and Searching For The Truth.

--gibraltar hands her a letter at the end of season 6 telling her the truth. wattson in the overtime comic acknowledges it and says that she does not trust Caustic because he framed Crypto.

--she then spends half of season 7 still calling crypto a traitor, and when the time comes, says that betrayal or not, she didn't know anything about him, and THAT is why he is in the wrong. he apologizes and reveals himself to her because she "seems trustworthy".

--she goes on to stop caustic's plans of mass genocide, now taking on the mindset of "i can fix him". going forward, crypto seems to take no issue with the fact that his best friend is like, still talking to the guy who framed him and talked shit about him and threatened him for several seasons.

--oh yeah also crypto raves about wattson to his mother a lot and potentially likes her lol

No matter what happened in this entire conflict, Wattson was always in the right. Even when it was revealed she knew the truth, her reasons for being mad changed and she was still In The Right. it's like the writers realized that her refusing to hear the truth made her look childish and wrong, and just. Changed it. To something also childish and wrong, but hey! She's technically correct this time; she DOESN'T know anything about Crypto. which is wrong and bad and he "turned on her" and "made her his enemy" DESPITE HER BEING THE ONE TO DO THIS TO *HIM*.

The story seems AVERSE to having Wattson be in the wrong. She's there to be cute and liked by everyone, even by standoffish people like Crypto and Wraith and Caustic and Blisk. She's there to be right even when she's wrong, and the story seems to be bend over backwards to MAKE her seem in the right. The worst thing she's done is blackmail Caustic, but like, it's not FRAMED that way. It's quirky! She has the evil scientist guy wrapped around her finger, and she can fix him, so she's doing it for totally good and valid reasons, see!

Wattson has almost no character outside of being Cute, Liked By Everyone, and as a plot device for other peoples' stories. today's comic and the reveal that she knew BEFORE season seven about the truth finally made me realize what the problem is: she's just, for lack of a better term, a mary sue. it's hard to sell all her cute cosmetics and nessie items and market her as the quirky good girl if she's done something wrong, after all /s.

i have no solution to this. it's just been a problem niggling at the back of my mind for five seasons, and i finally, finally put my finger on it, and needed to...vent about it, i guess. 😔

#apex legends

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evilzoldyck · 4 years

Text

Goosebumps

You should have taken the offer to go through the Haunted House together with your friend. The ominously decorated attraction that appeared fun and harmless from the entrance now became unnerving as you lonely walked down the hall, hands gripping tightly to your chest. It was your friends’ idea to visit this low-key haunted amusement located in the middle of nowhere, deep into the woods and far from the metropolitan area where the main entertainment took place.

Initially, you were opposed to the idea as the infamous ‘Haunted House’ your friends extolled was too far away and thus didn’t carry any signal in the area. Also, the ticket fee for one was way too pricy that it was enough to sour your night despite one of your friends, Jay, offering to spot you in which you politely declined.

The drive was far and so the place was about to close up soon when you arrived and after seeing all your friends’ enthusiasm in the pursuit for adrenaline, you couldn’t help but feel guilty for bringing the mood down. In the end you acquiesced, paid the fee and entered the house at your own discretion.

You thought it was ridiculous that company made you sign a contact beforehand, something about promising not to sue or whatever. You knew it was all just an act to heighten the customers’ anxiety instead of an actual legal precaution. Things wouldn’t be so bad inside as it was policy that their employees mustn’t directly touch or use an object to make physical contact with the customers.

However as of right now, you wished you could take those words back. For an underground seasonal business, they’ve managed to pull off an incredible event. The house was situated like a maze in which each room had a different elaborated concept which sometimes included your participation to get to the next stage.

The last room included a very convincing Witch with decent prosthetic makeup on her face and a shrilling laugh concocting a death potion in her black rusty cauldron. She instructed that you bring her the eyes of a goat, toad spit and a rotting tooth in return for your life, which generally meant she’ll show the exit. The challenge was a bit stress inducing as her ‘un-dead servants’ kept trying to grab at you while she wickedly reminded you to hurry up or else she would feed you to them.

In just a few minutes you’ve managed to collect all the ingredients, thankfully the spit and the eyes came in a jar. She begrudgingly took them from your hands and pointed to you a hidden exit before her servants came running at you in full speed, making you stumble into the small door and closing them shut. You could still hear her laughter through the door as you heaved out a sigh. Though your blood was pumping and your heart was beating out of your chest, it was a scare that left a smile on your face. Perhaps you now saw the appeal of haunted houses and rollercoasters.

In the end of a long narrow corridor was a red door. The sign underneath a glowing green exit read another in ‘blood’ to push hard for the ghosts in the mansion wishes to keep you here forever. You let out a small laugh and began to push at the handle, frowning when it wouldn’t budge. Putting all your weight against the door you whined when you made no progress.

Feeling chills down your spine, you grumbled at your Halloween costume, it didn’t help either that the place went crazy with the AC and the fog machine. Fixing your bloodied nurse outfit down and rubbing your arms to soothe the biting cold, you turned around and jumped back slightly in surprise at the sight of someone else with you.

A tall and large-build man stood imposingly from behind you. He wore dark pants and a single sleeveless shirt that was so thin you could make out the shadows of his bulging muscles and pectorals which made you blush and look away for a second. Either he was very serious about his character concept or he was just built like a Greek god. You cleared your throat and reverted your gaze to see that he was holding a large blood stained machete and a mask to cover his face.

“Um could you help me?” while pointing at the door you managed to ask guessingly. “What do you need to me to?” You asked once again, figuring out this was supposed to be the last challenge. However the man didn’t say anything, he just stared at you through the mask and though you couldn’t clear see his line of sight, you felt him raking his eyes up and down your body.

Growing uncomfortable at the stifling silence, you see a glint in his hand which revealed to be a key that he was holding. “Is that the key?” you hopefully questioned as you reached out for the key, knowing you won’t get a response anyway. “May I-“ you gasped when he held it out of your reach suddenly. You wore a tiny smile as you played this rather childish game, reaching out and jumping on your toes as he held it high above his head. You could feel the deep reverberations of his chest as he chuckled at your feeble attempts.

It was at that time you noticed you were far too close to him. Letting out another sharp gasp, the man pulled you close to him by the waist. With your hands to his chest, you could feel his strained muscles from underneath his shirt; his thumb softly rubbing your hips. You were sure this guy just violated one of the rules of this place.

When you were about to push him away, he brought the key close to your face finally allowing you to take it. Squeaking out a small ‘thank you’, you felt his grip reluctantly loosened as you turned back to the door to hastily unlock it. You noticed he was still boring his eyes into you as you closed the door from behind, not making a single movement as he stoically watched you close it. Stepping into the cool night air, you shrugged the strange the interaction off and decided against reporting him to the place. You didn’t really want to deal with the confrontation.

You heard a call of your name from the distance and smiled in relief. Reuniting with your friends around the car you joyously shared tales of your experiences inside. “I don’t know how you did it alone, I was with Mina and I almost went crazy.” Your friend Leigh-Anne exasperated, holding her hand into her still pounding heart.

“You should have gone with us!” Mina quipped. “I nearly socked the clown when he came out of the box- and when he came charging towards us I swear I nearly fainted.”

“Well you were fine enough to run and leave me behind!” jested Leigh-Anne, “you closed the door while the clown was still chasing after me. My heart was about to burst at that moment.”

“For real we were screaming so much you’d think an actual murder was taking place.” She sighed. “But it’s not as crazy as you two,” Mina pointed to you and Jay. “How could you both go alone?” you shrugged at her question and replied that you wanted to make the experience scarier for you as Jay agreed. Now thinking about it, maybe going as a group would make it more fun.

“The last one though,” you trailed. “Don’t you think it was a little weird?”

“The Witch?” Jay asked, raising a brow.

“No the last one, just by the exit.” You clarified to your friends, pointing at the door where you just left. However their expressions didn’t shift. “You know the guy with the machete and a mask? He was the one that held the key.” Your friends continued to look at you like you grew a head. You furrowed your brows in confusion. “You couldn’t possibly miss him he was so tall and huge.”

“There was no one there,” Mina laughed. “The exit was unlocked anyway why would there be a key?”

“I didn’t see anyone either on my turn too, the Witch just pointed the way out then it was over.”

“Holy shit, did you see an actual ghost then?”

“What? No, no he was real.” You awkwardly chuckled along. “Are you guys being serious right now?”

“That’s three to one, you’re being haunted.” Leigh-Anne made spooky noises and played with your hair teasingly as you rolled your eyes light-heartedly. When the lights finally shut from the establishment you all made a move to get inside the car.

“He was there.” You enunciated once more before getting inside.

“I believe you,” playfully sang Jay from the drivers seat.

The moon was at its peak, shining so brightly it made the drive just a bit easier without the streetlights to assist. Your friends were still happily engaging on sharing the stories of the place, occasionally making jokes at you and the mysterious ‘masked ghost’. Waving them off you returned your attention back on the window, it just came to you how deep inside the forest you were as trees were all your eyes could see. Not a moment later the car suddenly stopped as the engine sputtered and died out.

Jay cursed and propped the hood open before letting out another curse. “Um I’m going to go back and get help. Something wrong with the battery.” He quickly explained as he retrieved a flashlight from the glove compartment, getting ready to sprint.

“Wait! I’ll come with you,” you offered, getting out of the car. Jay refused, saying it would be quicker if he went alone. “You calling me slow?!” you called out as he was already far into the distance.

“There’s a reason why I was school’s best track and field and you weren’t!” you heard his faint yet breathy voice retaliate back at you as you scoff out a laugh at his remark.

Half an hour went by and you all started to get worried when he didn’t return. “I’m going after him,” you finally stated, getting ready to get out and run. Mina stated that she’ll go too while Leigh-Anne stayed back, suggesting that someone should stay in the car in case he came back.

Trekking down the road with your hand in hers MIna suddenly asked, “you know when you said you saw someone else in the Haunted House back then,” you hummed back in reply. “You were just joking right?” She gripped your hand tightly as you looked at her worried face. “It was just a joke to rile us up, there wasn’t actually a huge masked man with a machete?”

Knowing full well what she wanted to hear you replied back, “yeah of course.” Nonchalantly shrugging it off like it was nothing. “It was a poor joke now that I think about it.” Guilt tugged at your insides but you knew you couldn’t scare her even more, now that you were all at an extremely unpredictable environment.

You heard her sigh in relief and hugged your sides, “I knew it. You’re such a bad liar.” You weakly laughed at her jest and tried to push the thoughts of the strange man away. When you finally arrived back to the place it looked like a proper abandoned house. All the lights were off, you should’ve expected that as it was way past their opening hours, but all the cars that you assumed were the employees’ were gone too. You and Mina knocked on every door and window to get a response but your own voices echoed back at the empty place.

What’s stranger is that you couldn’t find Jay anywhere too. His flashlight, however, was found on the ground near the exit of the house. You figured there was no way that he could have went inside for all the doors and windows were barricaded shut. After a good twenty minutes of searching around the perimeters of where he could have gone, you and Mina decided to get back to the car with a heavy heart. The walk was fast but silent, neither of you had anything to say to each other.

It was when you saw the car with one of the door opened that you two began running towards it. “Leigh-Anne?” Mina gasped at the sight of the empty car. “What’s going on?” she exclaimed, tears springing up her eyes and as you were about to reply, you finally saw him. The masked man from the Haunted House with his machete freshly coated in blood, stalking leisurely towards the both of you. Mina turned and widened her eyes at the sight, grabbing her hand in yours you both made a run for it into the woods.

Breathing heavily through your nose you could hear his boots thumping against the ground, his speed gaining close to you both. At one point you both let go of each other’s hands to run faster and soon you couldn’t hear or see her anymore.

Knowing better than to call out her name and give out your location you began to look at your surroundings but it was so, so frustratingly dark. The kind of darkness that made your head ache from trying to see anything. The moonlight couldn’t offer any help for the trees’ thick foliage covered it all. Your eyes couldn’t make out anything and only when you heard Mina’s terrifying screams and a sudden silence through the dense forest did you find the strength to keep running.

Tears stung your eyes while your lungs burned like fire from overexertion. Tripping on a rock, you sobbed out a pathetic weep as you crawled forwards, not doubting that your knee was badly scraped in the process. Seeing as you were grabbing onto rocks, you glanced up to find a raging river in front of you.

Thick pairs of hands grabbed at your sides making you scream in response, kicking away at your assailant and scratching at his arms. The man grunted as he pinned your arms down with one hand swiftly and locked your legs together with his thighs. It was only then could you see your perpetrator clearly, his green eyes wide and dilated as he took in your form. Your breath was caught in your throat at how truly menacing he was up close. There was blood sprayed on his white mask and the smell of him thick with iron and sweat. For a moment you were paralysed with fear as he studied your face, fingers trailing your wet cheek softly along with your lips and nose.

The man came closer and placed his head between your breasts, breathing in the scent of you deeply. He must’ve lost himself in you for a moment as he caressed the curves of your body, relaxing his other grip on your hands. You made a quick decision to grasp onto a nearby stone to hit him straight on his temple. The man grunted in pain from your attack but didn’t fall in the end, your heart was at your throat when you realised you had messed up perhaps your only chance to escape. He glared angrily down at you and when you attempt at another swing, he blocked it by capturing your small wrists in his strong calloused ones.

“Agh!” you cried when he broke it with a simple squeeze, letting the rock fall from your hand. Nevertheless, that didn’t relent you from trying to fight him as you squirmed in his powerful hold. It was as if he knew that you weren’t planning to stop fighting him did he pick up the same rock you used to hit him with to successfully knock you out in one swift strike.

Groaning softly in pain, you feel yourself move through the air by a pair of secure arms. Looking ahead of you with your blurry vision, you saw the man stare ahead at a light that slowly came into view. There was a cabin dimly lit inside, tucked deep into the forestry and not that far from the river. You couldn’t bear to take a guess of what’s to happen to you the next time you woke up and so you let sleep cloud your consciousness instead.

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dallonm-archive · 3 years

Photo

[image description: three monstera leaves. The leaves and wall are tinted purple by string lights behind the plant. In the middle, in a white serif font and all caps, reads “LIFE CYCLE OF MASSIVE STARS”. At the bottom, in the same font but smaller, reads “update #1″ /end id]

LIFE CYCLE OF MASSIVE STARS | UPDATE #1

Before I start, this is an autistic OwnVoices novel and it’s Autism Acceptance Month! Remember that awareness is passive and acceptance is active. And whilst this book is autistic OwnVoices I want to stress that it doesn’t cover the full autistic experience; autism is so individualistic and this story only stems from my experience. Make sure you to listen to all autistics, not just those who can speak and live independently and present in a way that suits neurotypical society. Support autistic creatives and if you’re also a creative, include autistic characters in your work! Autism is not a disease. It does not need to be cured.

Hey y’all! This has sure been a week! I gave myself the goal of 15,000 words for Camp Nano and somehow hit that in 5 days? I have literally never written at that pace before so I’m a little shocked lol. I don’t intend to keep that pace but the momentum has made drafting very fun and? drafting this has been a literal dream. I was really worried because March was a month long slump I expected to carry into April. I want to disclaim that I’m currently out of school and work because of the pandemic so I have all the free time to write and that definitely contributed! But also as a neurodivergent and disabled writer, free time does not always equal writing, so to know that I am capable of writing like this, even if not always, it is Such a gamechanger. Also this story makes me miss University so much I actually can’t take it :(

LCOMS has been a dream so far because the protagonists are all characters I’ve had for 5-8 years, and | spent those years struggling to figure out their stories. Even when I settled on this story, originally Patchwork, there was like 4 versions of it before I landed on this - none ever drafted beyond a couple thousand words because they just Never Worked. But the wait was worth it because holy shit I feel like I struck gold. This story feels so me, it’s so much fun to write, and I don’t think a story has come to me this easy before. It’s given me such a zest for storytelling again that I didn’t realise was missing. I’m slowing things down now because creative boundaries and self care >>>>, but I just passed 19k words - though some of the chapters are very unfinished because my priority has been mapping out the story’s skeleton as far as I can, then filling in the gaps based off what I learnt. I wanna put a passage before the cut so it’s not just me rambling about bullshit and no content, but it’s hard to pick just one, so here’s a non-linear scene that I :) cannot elaborate on :)

(CW: alcohol)

[image description: the side of a ferris wheel against black sky. The wheel is lit white, but at the bottom it’s coloured a mix of pink, blue and green. At the top, in a white serif font, reads “The ferris wheel lights blur between turquoise, magenta, mint, lavender, casts the puddles into technicolour. “ /end id]

Picture this: December 17th. End of term. End of year. Cloudless night, stars winking. Fargate glows, market stalls lit by yellow fairy lights line the street like candle stubs, gently burning. It’s raining. It has all day. Dampened your new beanie and scarf but you’re not mad, even if you’ll cringe at the texture when you take them off later. The ferris wheel lights blur between turquoise, magenta, mint, lavender, casts the puddles into technicolour. Your eyes and feet ache, but you’re not mad. And the mulled wine that buzzed warm in your bloodstream now coils in your stomach, but you’re not mad. You’re queuing for the technicolour wheel, even though you know it’ll be underwhelming and a waste of £4, but you’re not mad. Chocolate is usually too sweet for you, but he bought a pack of snowflake shaped ones - each carved with their own design - and when he passes the paper bag over you don’t say no. They taste like raspberry. He grins at you.

I have once again written a long update because I am autistic and have no self control; more excerpts and chapter-by-chapter rambles are as usual under the cut!

(content warnings are specific to the respective excerpt, but as a general warning there’s a lot of alcohol mentions!)

Originally I wanted 3 parts for 3 semesters, but I might do 2? Especially because in the UK at least the spring and summer semester kinda blend into one. The chapters are grouped by 3 - one for every POV character - but that’s more to help with writing because I get more done if I break it down like that, but I also like how it’s shaped the story structurally.

Sometimes the three chapters will be each of the character’s POV on a single event, sometimes they’re more individual but still follow a general idea (for example, one of them is how each character’s first three weeks of the semester goes). As usual for me the plot here is ~non-existent, especially at this stage, but everything is still connected and threaded together and thats all we really need. The chapters are also pretty short at the moment, none of them are over 3k and only tackle 1-3 scenes. This is something I feel is working really nicely now but I’m not gonna commit to it for the entire novel. I like chapter length variety! But right now we are just going with the flow :)

The most unexpected part is this being in second person, which I decided impulsively the night before Nano because I have :) zero self control :). I was unsure if it’d work in Multi POV, but it’s created such a unique tone that I can’t imagine the story without anymore, even if it’ll need tweaking over drafts. I think it suits the story so well! I’m just torn about it being in past or present, so if you see tense jumps in the excerpts no you did not <3 I’m not naming chapters right now beyond the character’s name, but part one is titled Growing Pains.

[image description: photo of a city at night. To the left are skyscrapers with lots of lit up windows behind a chain-link fence. To the right is an unlit building. Near the middle is a bright streetlight. In the middle, in a white serif font, reads “growing pains”. /end id]

1: Tomas

We start in the most overrated part of Uni, fresher’s week <3 The drinking and clubbing culture of UK university is a big part of this novel but in a way that’s like “hey this can be fun sometimes but sometimes it’s really not and it’s also really not for everyone.” Our three POVs go to a club night and really don’t care for it. Tomas does not want to be here, is in a weird as shit mood, and instead of looking for his friends he goes to the smoking area with a man he just met called Damiano. I really wanna rewrite this because I wrote it with Zero Idea of where the story was going, so here’s the one part of it that I consider salvageable <3

Damiano shoves his phone in your hands, brightness puncturing darkness. You hadn’t noticed the dimmed lights until then, but the room blued, music and time slowed. Though his notes are on dark mode, his phone brightness is on two fucking high. Your eyes sting. Cracks travel up the screen like veins.

Each character also has a specific image they keep seeing in things that are never actually there and they all make me like 🤠 hey besties what do these mean are you okay?? I Do Not know what they mean yet, but Tomas’ is veins. (Also shout out to me for finally settling on a spelling for his name after 5 years and by that I mean thank you to my friends for peer pressuring me into choosing Tomas lol)

My absolute favourite part of this story is the character voices. They are all SO fun to write, and I feel like I settled into a good combo of My Literary Prose Bullshit and they’re very specific, often very sarcastic voices. They also say fuck like, so many fucking times. RIP to me if I decide to query this <3

2: Kristen

Okay first off Kristen is THE funniest character I’ve written. He is SO fun. I wish I was his bestie but he’s also been my bestie since 2013. We meet him in the gender neutral bathrooms being annoyed by a very rich and very tone deaf girl. Classism and the UK class divide is one of the biggest themes of this novel, and Kristen is a very proud working class Northerner (the North is massively underfunded and unsupported by the Gov compared to the South) and cannot stand the Tories (Conservative Party). Extremely fucking valid of him

(CW: blood)

“I’m Floss. Florence.” Of course she was. Fucking Florence. “Where are you from?”

You don’t look at her. Eyes on your reflection, the glittered cheekbones. You busy yourself with your eyeliner, gliding the pen over gaps and smudges that don’t exist. “Barnsley, babe.” It’s only a half lie this time - if you tell her you were born in Liverpool she’d probably look at you like you’re a dead rat on the side of a dodgy alleyway. But maybe that’d be better because then she’d leave you the fuck alone.

“Oh! That’s like well close isn’t it. I’m from Reigate.” Her voice breathes trust fund and Waitrose, tries to speak like it doesn’t. You try not to laugh.

“Reigate! I bet your parents are right little Tories, aren’t they?”

She playfully slapped your shoulder. She thinks you’re friends. "Not every rich person is a Tory!” Don’t roll your eyes don’t roll your eyes don’t roll your eyes. “Is that blood on your hands?”

“Huh?” You look: faded red dye dried to your palm, blotted on your fingertips. It is dye, because your hair is as of four hours ago a fierce “Real Red”. But it could be blood. “No, it’s hair dye.”

If you think he’s being harsh, she literally calls him a slur like 3 lines after this <3 Fuck rich people half of this book is me clowning on them.

Kristen’s recurring Imagery is blood, except sometimes it’s less clear if it’s actually blood or not. Once again, besties are you okay ????

3: Junie

Junie my beloved <3 love her so much. She finds Kristen in the bathroom, and they agree to look for Tomas, until Tomas texts to say he already left. But the biggest part of this chapter is the absolute crisis she has over kissing for a girl for the first time to ABBA :)

(CW: alcohol)

[image description: a disco ball against a red-purple background. The disco ball casts dots of light against the across the ceiling. At the bottom, in a white serif font, reads: “Dancing Queen bounces against the walls. The disco ball casts specks over the ceiling, floor, walls, your skin, hair, eyes like broken glass.” /end id]

You don’t listen to 80s music, or 70s, but this room is smaller than the main floor, not claustrophobic, less freshers. Yet, even without the mask of a crowd, nobody notices the girl in the corner kissing the other girl. A girl you don’t know. You’d only gone up to her because she has purple hair and you had to tell her how much you love it - what dye is it? Professional or homemade? Did you have to bleach your hair? Professional or homemade? Will your hair fall out if you bleach it at home? If you dye your hair purple, do you become part of the Milky Way or part of Andromeda? She turns and sticks her tongue out to display her fresh tongue piercing, like a silver bullet lodged in flesh. “Dance with me, you look lost.” She has an allure to her, the Andromeda hair, the bullet in the tongue - do you want to pull it out with your teeth, or lodge it in your own skin? But she asks you to dance, and you fall into her orbit, if only for a few songs. Dancing Queen bounces against the walls. The disco ball casts specks over the ceiling, floor, walls, your skin, hair, eyes like broken glass. Her tongue in your mouth, yours in hers, bullet grazing against your lips. She tastes of vodka and cherries and metal.

I really, really feel for Junie. She’s recently out, and she’s only just navigating what it means to exist as a lesbian. She kisses a girl and immediately regrets it, because she’s a hopeless romantic and was hoping her first kiss with a girl wouldn’t be in the back of a club, but she also doesn’t regret it because it was a good kiss and they’ll never see each other again lol. Junie’s recurring imagery is glass and once again, besties are you okay

4: Junie

I don’t know how I feel about back to back POV chapters but that’s just how this set worked. The next 3 are immediately after the events of the first 3, after they’ve all left the club. Kristen and Junie walk home together, and most of this and his subsequent chapter is establishing relationship dynamics and <3 this story made me love writing dialogue y’all. This story has a lot of dark elements, so it’s really refreshing to be able to have the light-hearted moments as well. Like these characters are all going through it but they’re also Gen Z 20 year olds who grew up using humour to cope like what else are they meant to do

“We should’ve got that flat on Brunswick. It’s literally down the street from the SU - we’d just have to walk down a hill and then we’d be home.” He complains.

“Kristen, that flat had a rat problem. I saw one scurrying behind the oven.”

“Yeah, and we live with Tomas Meijer now, so what’s the difference?” He faces you, walks backwards, grin plastered on his face.

“That was mean.” You feign annoyance. You sound like a schoolteacher.

“It’s just how we are, you know. The love hate relationship. Like night and day or some shit. I’d kill for that boy but like, he’s still a rat. He’s the same to me - did he tell you he called me a malnourished ferret once in first year? In English and Dutch. Don’t even remember what it is in Dutch but he really came at me with two knives like that.”

Kristen and Junie don’t really know each other well - Junie is Tomas’ friend from class and Kristen and Tomas met in dorms, and a series of shitty housemates in second year brought them all together. It’s funny because I really worried Junie would end up with no clear place in the group and more like a third wheel to Kristen and Tomas but as I started writing I realised that her and Kristen are gonna become besties like. Instantaneously. Love this for them <3

5: Kristen

Essentially mirrors the last chapter. Him and Junie arrive home and have a heart to heart in the living room about gender <3 I love this for them <3

6: Tomas

Tomas goes home with Damiano and they hook up, which is very out of character for Tomas so it’s like his I Am So Random. I Can’t Believe I Just Did That moment. Damiano is a really sweet dude though it’s all good, but he’s here to stay and I can just tell it’s gonna get messy :/ I actually really love how this chapter came out but whilst I have no problem with reading or writing non-explicit sex scenes I’m also like a would rather die than put that on tumblr dot com oops

7: Kristen

we’ve skipped a week ahead to the day before semester starts, and the next three chapters are basically like a character study of where each of them are mentally. It’s not the best :/ This is also the point where Day 1 Of Camp me had literally no idea what I was doing. LCOMS is different from the way I pants Revelations, Revelations because with the latter I find it much easier to brainstorm scenes in my head but with this one, it really is a surprise until I open the doc. It’s created some really interesting moments though.

Kristen visits an amateur photographer friend named Kasia to model for her. I struggled to find anything that included info I’m fine with sharing, but I learnt a LOT about Kristen and his mental state, which was surprising since he’s lived in my head rent free for 8 years now. It’s messy <3 The summary: he sees himself as a mannequin, and he decides that he likes it that way, but he also doesn’t know who’s moving his joints into poses. Bestie???

8: Junie

Junie unpacks her room a week after moving in. Autistic queen <3 This is one of the unfinished chapters, and I have zero motivation to finish it because there’s a scene missing and I cannot for the life of me figure out what it is. The gist of it though is she FaceTimes a friend from secondary school that definitely was her gay awakening that she only realised was her gay awakening in the last year. Messy <3

9: Tomas

One of my favourite chapters. It’s split into two halves, a light-hearted moment of all three housemates at a superstore because <3 grocery store scenes my beloved <3 and then Tomas’ Everything Is Bad exploration at the end. There’s a moment in the first half where Tomas and Kristen have a heart to heart in the candle aisle, and Tomas asks Kristen where he thinks they’ll be in their thirties. I winged this in a sprint and I’m obsessed with it, it’s all about the ~dynamic~

“Well, he has student debt for one. But that’s not on him. That’s on the Tories. But I like to think they’ll be out of power by then. Boris might even be dead, if we’re lucky. But again, not on me.” He’s quiet again. You watch him think. “He’d be a music teacher probably, or an English teacher. But like, a cool one. He doesn’t teach secondary school because he doesn’t hate himself. Maybe a Sixth Form, or even better a Uni. His students would love him because he’d be able to take a joke and also like, not hound on them for having mental illnesses or life struggles?” Neither of you look at the aisles anymore, just circle the home section of Big Tesco. “He’d also do a lot of charity work. He has a foundation-charity-thing for queer and autistic kids to get accessible music lessons, because creative therapy is like, the best thing - besides Prozac but I digress - and it’d be better than the old white men from CAMHs who act like you don’t exist by your eighteenth birthday. And he’d have a cool little flat in Sheffield where the landlord lets him paint the walls so every room is a different colour. Turquoise kitchen. Magenta Living room. Lavender bedroom. Mint bathroom.” He looks at you like he forgot you were there. “You really let me ramble like that in the middle of Big Tesco, huh? That felt like a fucking therapy moment.” He laughs a little, like he’s nervous.

“Nah, it was a good answer. Maybe if Tomas-in-his-thirties doesn’t move back to the Netherlands, he’ll rent the apartment next to Kristen-in-his-thirties.”

Kristen pouts. “Aw, you don’t wanna be my roomie anymore?”

“No, you called me an animal for eating pineapple on pizza.”

“Deserved. And you called me a malnourished ferret.”

You smile. “You’re not gonna let that down, are you?”

He smiles. “Of course not.”

Kristen tells Tomas he knows Something Happened to him over summer, and gets him to promise to tell him when he’s ready. The second half of the chapter takes place back at the house. Tomas is grieving, and it’s starting to creep into all elements of his thought. In this one specifically, he’s reminded of his top surgery and his memories in the hospital for that starts to blend with his memory of being in the hospital to grieve. Tomas is interesting as trans rep because like, he is trans rep curated for me specifically <3 Tomas was a huge comfort character for me when I was younger and when I realised I was trans, I looked at him and was like oh. He had a very smooth coming out and transitioning process (bc mine is the opposite and I need to project :) ), but right now he views his transness as like, a chapter of his life that was important but is now closed, so he doesn’t think about it a lot anymore, but the combo of grief and its mental impacts causes him to think about it more and he realises he has a very unhealthy internal relationship with his transness. Whilst the big idea at the start of Tomas’ arc is to show trans peace, I really wanted to take a moment to acknowledge the grieving process that comes with being trans. Literally the moment that made me realise “oh god, this is real and I can’t ignore it” was googling “im scared i might be trans” and realising how normal those tangled feelings are. Tomas’ experience of it is only fleeting, but I wanted to show that it’s normal. That being said, there’s no transphobia in this story. It is ultimately a Trans Peace story but also a trans story that, for me at least, is realistic. And the thoughts don’t last long, because his mind circles back to the grieving process.

(CW: graphic surgery and hospital imagery, vomit mention, death)

[image description: a darkened picture of an empty hospital room. The only light comes in through the window through thin white curtains. In the middle, in a white serif font, reads “ Scalpel gliding across the chest; were the cuts they made as thin as the line between surgery and autopsy? “ /end id]

Picture this: The hospital room. Clinical lights like exit wounds in the ceiling. Everything hurts. Haven’t slept properly in weeks. Can barely eat without it coiling and tangling in your stomach only for nothing to come up when you heave over the toilet. Messy hair, sunken eye bags. Dull eyes. The hospital room. The hospital halls. The hospital waiting room. The hospital car park. The drive to the hospital. The sleepless night before the hospital visit. The locked in the armchair next to the phone waiting for the hospital to call. The silence shrills harsher than the phone’s ring. But ask yourself this: who’s in the bed? You or him? The memories are different but the same. Oil and water. Shouldn’t be mixed. But it’s hard not to. Picture the two of you on the operating table and on the metal slab. Too far from reality to feel skin slice. Scalpel gliding across the chest; were the cuts they made as thin as the line between surgery and autopsy?

There’s a lot of paragraphs in the story that start with Picture This:. I have no idea what it means, it just reads cool lmao

10: Junie

we skip around 3 weeks now to see how the kids are dealing with the start of semester and well. They’re managing! Junie actually has a good chapter here, because she experiences Baby’s First Queer Class Crush

[image description: a purple sunset with a large pink cloud. In the middle, in a white serif font, reads you notice her background is of a purple sunset. You wonder if purple is her favourite colour like you and if she took it and if she likes photography and if she’d take photos of you “ /end id]

You listen, touch type your notes without properly processing the words yet, but instead of studying the PowerPoint, you study her: how she tucks a strand of black hair - free from her messy bun - behind her ear. The three studs in her earlobe, three little gold stars. The way her eyebrows furrow when she’s confused, and the way her face relaxes when she figures it out. How she touch types like you, how her two brass bracelets jangle and how you’re the only one that hears it. She minimises Word briefly, and you notice her background is of a purple sunset. You wonder if purple is her favourite colour like you and if she took it and if she likes photography and if she’d take photos of you. Lavender polo shirt, lavender perfume. She doesn’t wear make-up, but a tiny black heart sits under left eye.

Junie’s dreams of a photographer girlfriend are quickly shattered when she admits the photo’s from Pinterest, but otherwise this is so <3 the sapphic crisis of it all.

You walk out together, and she tells you she only got into Sheffield that weekend, and it was a nightmare to explain to the tutors why. “It’s like, they forget we have lives sometimes. Lives we can’t control.” She shakes her head. “It’s okay now though, I’m here now.”

You almost trip on the stairs up to the main floor, and her hand is warm against your wrist. Your cheeks redden, but she just asks if you’re okay, smiles when you are. Tells you she’s late for a seminar, but it was lovely to meet you. Thanks again for the lecture notes. Calls you a lifesaver. Fades into the between-classes rush. You’re glad she’s here now.

again she is so <3 i get it babes i get it <3

In other news, at the end of the chapter Kristen drops the most relatable line of the entire fucking book:

“You know how like, when it rains, all the worms come out and do a funky little dance? Yeah so basically: the rain is LIT3001 right. And the worms are all of my mental illnesses.”

11: Tomas

Tomas turns 21 on October 13th so naturally like anyone in his early 20s he has multiple crisis’ about it. I still haven’t figured this chapter ~out yet but it sure exists! It just sucks the same way it sucks to be a young adult in the late 2010s. But here’s Kristen being the most relatable character in the book again and getting bullied for it :/

(CW: alcohol)

"I still can't believe you both do a science. Like, it actually baffles me - I could not be more further from that." Kristen refills his glass, measures the vodka level with his index. "Just a babe and his silly little BA against the world."

"You know if you wanna be a BA babe you have to actually, like, graduate."

12: Kristen

Kristen is personally like I will pretend my degree does not exist and honestly? I get it King. He visits his Dad, since he only lives 30 minutes away, but most of the chapter is him thinking about Tomas and their messy friendship and the fact that Tomas is kinda ghosting him despite literally living together :/ Anyway here’s Kristen’s cat :)

Mar snoozes on your pillow, half curled like a croissant. Orange fluff against grey sheets, and you’re not mad at the fur debris she’ll inevitably leave. Her head pops up when you sit next to her, “you forget about me yet?”. You scratch her head and it’s like you’re 12 again and you don’t have to worry about rent or degrees or masters applications or careers or groceries or housemates and you haze through Sundays snoozing in bed with your new kitten. Technically she was a birthday present, but dad couldn’t wait an extra month to adopt her. Said he saw it in her eyes at the shelter, that she belonged here. You named her Marmalade because you were a dumbass eleven year old and also thought marmalade was the shit back then. She stretches her legs and yawns. Plops her head back down, back to sleep. “Yeah, me too.”

13: Tomas

The next three chapters centre around each character’s Halloween, because <3 Halloween my beloved <3. Tomas’ starts off with him and Kristen being ~homoerotic and him being a ~disaster about it.

w[image description: a photo of a blue planet - Neptune - against a black background. In the middle, in a white serif font, reads “You don’t know which palette he’s using, but you remember his favourite is space themed: Mars red, Neptune blue, Jupiter orange - you try to guess which planet he thinks looks best against olive. He taps the brush against the palette. Imagine the planets. How they dandelion in the air.” /end id]

When you sit in front of him, your knees press together. When he tilts your head up, thumb on chin, nail grazing the curve of your lip, his hand is ice on your skin. He studies your face, you close your eyes. When he pulls back, you swear you still feel his thumbprint on your skin. You don’t know which palette he’s using, but you remember his favourite is space themed: Mars red, Neptune blue, Jupiter orange - you try to guess which planet he thinks looks best against olive. He taps the brush against the palette. Imagine the planets. How they dandelion in the air. He holds your head in place, hand sprawls over you cheek like veins. Brushes colour into your eye socket. Underneath the radiator, your phone buzzes twice. Don’t say anything. Ignore your heartbeat.

(before this Tomas threw his phone at the radiator because someone texted him :) yeah okay mood :) )

this story is really about the ~gay disasters and also the ~dialogue

You flop onto your bed, arms crossed over your face. “I dunno. I might just print off all the emails Uni's sent me about my dissertation. Staple them to a jacket and tell people I'm going as mental illness."

"Tomas, if you want to go as mental illness then you don't need a costume at all."

Unfortunately the rest of the chapter is not as fun because plot had to happen but this first scene was :)

14: Junie

Junie is not a fan of Halloween so she gives up halfway through the night and invites the girl she met in her lecture over to bake cookies at 1am instead. Fellas is this gay?

(CW: alcohol)

The girl in the kitchen brought cookie cutters in pink Tupperware. She explains she’s had them since she was eight, but she hasn’t had a chance to use them this Autumn. She has seven: cat, butterfly, crescent moon, heart, three stars matryoshka’d together. “I have more, these are just my go to ones. I’m a bit of a collector.” She lines them up on the counter, you trace the outline of the cat. She says she didn’t want to bring too many, but she likes having the options with no plan, the potential. You want to tell her that, after you invited her over, you spritzed the counters with lavender surface cleaner twice and tucked the discarded vodka and raspberry liqueur bottles in the cabinet you can barely reach. You piled unfolded laundry into your closet and hid drooping plants behind your closed curtains when you had zero intention of her inviting her to your room. You want to ask her why she said yes, why she replied in two minutes at one in the morning, and you want to ask her why people feel the need to cookie cutter themselves into a false potential. She asks if you want to bake with coconut or chocolate chip.

she is actually such a disaster around girls i love her so much

The girl in your kitchen clears up glass that isn’t hers. You drop the measuring jug and it fireworks against tile. No shards lodge in your skin. Whilst she cleans, insists that it’s okay, you brew peppermint tea because you insist it’s the least you can do. The girl tells you a story about how she did the exact same thing, when she was nine, and her mother shrieked so loud the neighbours banged at the door a minute later. She laughs, muted. You apologise again. She insists it’s okay again. Rain hardens against the window, looks like TV static. You breathe in the peppermint steam.

The biggest thing I’ve learnt since drafting is that, at it’s core, this is a love story. And that makes me so excited because so many people, especially in mainstream media, still think that autistic people are incapable of love - or even worse, undeserving.

15: Kristen

Kristen’s favourite holiday is Halloween so naturally on his special day I had to make him go through it :) I can’t share a lot of this, but it feels right to end this beast of an update on this beast of an excerpt because it came to me out of absolutely nowhere and it is one of my favourite passages I’ve ever written OOPS

(CW: death, parental death)

[image description: a cluster of stars against a dark blue, almost black sky. In the middle, in a white serif font, reads “You want to ask your dad how something can end if for you it never began, but he’s asleep in his armchair back home. You look at the stars. You wonder if any of them are her.“ /end id]

You’ve mapped Sheffield’s streets since 13 so you know you’re walking the wrong way. This isn’t the way to Crookes. This isn’t the way out the city centre. You should order an Uber. You keep walking. You stop at a crossing. There’s no cars. You don’t cross. The traffic light flashes red and bleeds on your face. The stars are out tonight, and now it’s 2004 and you’re in the lounge with Lion King in the VHS. You’re off sick and your neighbour - Mel, recently retired, recently widowed - nurses a glass of brandy in your dad’s armchair because you don’t know it yet, but he can’t afford to miss work. You’re sprawled on the dusty-red rug when Simba and Mufasa sprawl in the grass and Mufasa tells Simba that all the stars are the Kings of the past and they are watching over him. You ask recently retired, recently widowed Mel if that’s true; her smile is happy but her eyes are sad and she says “yes, and not just Kings. Nobody leaves Earth, they just move to the stars.”

Ten minutes later, Mufasa is flung off a gorge’s edge; you haven’t studied storytelling yet, but you understand those two moments are connected. And when you relay this to dad over ready made pasta that evening, you ask him if people really live in the stars: Sometimes, when they can’t live here anymore. Then you ask if they can come back from the stars: No, but people remember them. They’ll tell stories about them, so people don’t forget. Then you ask if memories and stories are like stars: A little. Then you ask why they can’t live here anymore: It’s hard to explain, Kris.

After dinner, he lets you play on the plastic slide in the garden as he scrubs the dishes. You climb to the top and try to see faces in the stars, but it’s too cloudy. And after that but before bedtime, you’re sprawled on the dusty-red rug again, and Lion King is in the VHS again, and as Simba and Nala are bathed by their mothers again, your five year old mind connects what’s different about you. You go to ask dad about it, but he’s asleep in his armchair. It’s 2018, you’re stood on a phantom street in Sheffield. You want to ask your dad how something can end if for you it never began, but he’s asleep in his armchair back home. You look at the stars. You wonder if any of them are her.

And I usually don’t do this, but I think the playlist for this wip is absolutely fucking elite, so here’s a handful of the songs that I think encapsulate the story the best:

The Wombats – Greek Tragedy

Duncan Laurence – Arcade

FKA Twigs – Two Weeks

Peach Pit – Alrighty Aphrodite

Khalid – Saturday Nights

Alfie Templeman – Stop Thinking (About Me)

Rina Sawayama – 10-20-40

If you read this far, then I love you and we shall have a platonic wedding this summer. But I cannot express how excited I am about this story and to see where it goes!

#atlastracking #LCOMS #writing update #amwriting #seriously though i have had the best week but also my brain? a fried egg #sfoidhfsdf even before the cut this post is long i hate it here #long post

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southitaly · 4 years

Text

On Historical Hetalia Collective

TW: anti-blackness and anti-Indigenous racism, Islamophobia, abusive language, gaslighting.

Posting on a burner acct mainly because I’ve survived tumblr death threats/doxxing before and don’t want to deal with it again. I’ve been contemplating coming forward about this for a while — it’s been three and a half years since this transpired. In the historical APH fandom in particular, we are especially prone to thinking we are different from the “fashy” fans who don’t have a problem with Nazi Germany being a character in the show, with its casual dismissal of colonial and genocidal history, and its erasure of the Shoah and the war crimes of imperial Japan (amongst scores of other things). Those of us who enjoy playing with the premise and focusing on a more faithful depiction of history seem to think we are exempt from recreating those same oppressive structures in our own work, in our own fandom groups and relationships. This is absolutely not the case.

Most of this took place approx. January through May 2017. I was freshly 21 at the time and the people responsible were ~19-20; I recognize that people change, and make mistakes, and grow, especially at that age. But I can also safely say at 19 I was not doing or saying these kinds of things to people, and that if I did and have forgotten, I believe I should be held responsible for those things. That being said, I also believe that these events must be brought to light.

I joined historical hetalia collective in the late summer of 2016 at its founding. At the time, I did not emphasize my Métis identity because, as someone who is also Italian and has a strong interest in Italian history, it was not the focus of why I wanted to join and what I wanted to discuss. I was very excited to talk with other creators in what I assumed was an anti-racist, canon-critical setting. Lyz, then “yelyzavetaart” on tumblr, along with one other person was a founder. I was the first person appointed as a moderator, eventually joined on the moderator team of about five people, including Alex stirringwinds and a white Ukrainian-American person who went by “ilaaer”.

It was around winter 2016 that a user named Baguette (at the time petitebaguette on tumblr) joined. Baguette very quickly began saying incredibly racist things in the server; most did not address it. Baguette maintained that reverse racism was real, that white women were targeted specifically for sexual violence by men of color, & that Europe does not owe reparations to First Nations and other Indigenous people, amongst other things.

When I voiced discomfort — pointing out that as an Indigenous person, much of her racism was pointed at people like myself in particular and not necessarily at the non-Black, non-Indigenous others to the same extent— people on the mod team were quick to tell me that I was being out of line and aggressive in my approach. When I advocated for her to be banned, others on the team were quick to give her another warning, another chance, instead. This resulted in an incredibly hostile environment; instead of a racist European being told to examine her bigotry, the group decided it was more important to tell me to watch my tone.

I truly began to question my own experience and all of my relationships on the server. All of these people who I loved to speak to about history and things I cared about did not actually care about my well being, let alone that of others experiencing similar things. I was not more important than the collective’s optics; standing in solidarity with Native people was less important than any bridges that might be burned in doing so. I was concerned about the effect that such rhetoric going unchallenged would have on younger members; I did not like what kind of conclusions were being encouraged.

It culminated when Baguette posted about the “preferential” treatment Muslims got from the French government over Christians, a major Islamophobic dogwhistle. As someone who has also lived in France I decided to challenge her on her beliefs. When she reacted poorly, I was blamed, stripped of my moderator title, and effectively banned as well.

Upon telling me I was being removed, Lyz said something to the effect of me being “hostile” towards a person who said genocide, as a European, was not her problem, and that members in the collective should not be “caught in the crossfire” of our dispute. I would argue that being on the receiving end of a racist tirade is not a “personal dispute” -- the team absolutely failed to address the problem and then also blamed the person who was being targeted.

While I commend Lyz for trying to be diplomatic at the time, Lyz had zero problem banning an openly homophobic European (by the name of Nessai) a few months prior. Somehow, when the question of Native people came up, Lyz — and the other non-Natives on the administrative “board” — could not summon that same conviction. Somehow, a Native person could not be given that same empathetic treatment. Baguette’s racism was condemned in private, sure, but decisive anti racist action was far too “radical”. I should not have to elaborate on how and why this is racist.

In short, tumblr user petitebaguette (now sartreslemonade) was a virulent racist. Users Alex stirringwinds, Lyz neviart, ilaaer, and many others were not only complicit, but enabled that behavior by systematically gaslighting and then deplatforming the one Native person on the moderator team who demanded she be removed for her actions. All of them should be held responsible, and creators of color (especially Black and Indigenous creators) in the APH fandom should be aware of this.

I have included screenshots of some of these conversations below — I sincerely invite others to make the judgment themselves. I know of at least one other Native person who had similar problems in this same collective, not long after I left. I do not know if there are others — I know people can and do change. I hope that by the time this is posted, all those mentioned can and are doing better by Native and Black people. I hope that my story does not repeat itself in other mouths with the same cast of people. I have included what I have been able to recover/keep over the years: my letter of dismissal from Lyz, some of the things Baguette was saying, the interaction between myself and Baguette when talking about anti-indigenous racism in France, and Alex’s response to that conversation.

Lyz’s letter:

Some examples of the things Baguette was saying:

Interaction between myself and her about reparations for Native people:

Alex’s response:

#aph #hetalia #axis powers hetalia #historical hetalia #hetalia: axis powers

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aitaikimochi · 4 years

Photo

Here is the full translation of Nomura, Kitase, and Toriyama, and Hamaguchi’s interview from the FF7R Famitsu feature! Nomura talks about Jessie's popularity, the decision to include the Masssage Parlour scene, comments about the next installment's release, and more! Kitase discusses how it’s like working with a new generation of game developers, explains a bit more about the scene with Sephiroth and Cloud at the Edge of Creation, and refers to the Remake as the “New FFVII Story.” Toriyama mentions that the staff who worked on the original game wanted to create a completely new game while younger staff wanted to stay true to the original. Hamaguchi explains more about the development process as well as how they came up with the battle system, what type of system they have planned for Part 2, and more!

DIRECTOR TETSUYA NOMURA INTERVIEW —Now that the game has been released, how are you feeling?

Nomura: Well first off, I feel very relieved. Although there’s still a long way to go on the road to completing the entire story, we are now able to see exactly which direction we will be heading.

—From the game’s battle system to its story to the elaborate details of Midgar’s various environments, including songs that sometimes only play in one scene, the game is full of a richness that has been carefully crafted, which shows that a lot of time and effort was spent creating this game. The staff must have been very enthusiastic, right?

Nomura: I think it’s due to the staff’s love for FFVII. The enthusiasm from the fans also helped propel us forward.

—Are there any elements from either the Original game or part of the compilation that you wanted to make a reality or something that you wanted to have in the past game that then added into this game?

Nomura: Definitely the world itself as well as how richly the people are portrayed. With all the different compilations gathered, it was rather easy to create the world. I think we were able to convey the importance of the areas seamlessly.

—FF7R really digs deep into the Original Game’s story, but there is a surprising development towards the end of the game. With Remakes, there’s always a faction of people who don’t want anything changed, but there are also those who actually want things to be changed. Were there discussions among the creators on whether or not you should change things?

Nomura: Since the concept of FF7R was already decided from the beginning, there wasn’t that much discussion. However, since each individual had different ways of perceiving things, we did discuss exactly how far we will change the story. I believe that I was the one who actually put a stop on several ideas towards the latter half of development (laughs).

—The Remake contains the “Whispers of Fate” that are not present in the original story, but what was the intent of having this presence? In English, they’re called the Whispers, but in Japanese they’re called the “Feelers.” Is there a specific reason for this difference, for example if the word “Feeler” was the origin of the name?

Nomura: Nojima-san actually requested us to give the Whispers an eerie aura. Initially, the Whispers were designed to be made out of small particles of sand that crumbled while still maintaining its shape, but also unclear in form. We then created an image of them wearing a robe, but more so than that, when we had to make a lot of them appear together, that’s when their form took a clear shape. The word “feeler” means to sense and to touch, but at the moment I cannot say anymore than that.

—Those who come into contact with Aerith can see the Whispers, right? Also, was Aerith able to see them from the beginning?

Nomura: People can see the Whispers when they come into contact with Aerith. However, at the moment I am unable to tell you when Aerith started seeing them.

—Instead of always being on edge, Cloud seems to behave more cooly but instead comes off as uncool to those around him. Aerith also seems a bit more mature than the original’s portrayal of her, and Barret seems a more unhinged and tense. The characters all seem to have a new side of them now. What kind of concepts did you use to add to the characters in this game?

Nomura: I personally think that the characters still have the same image as they did before, but with much more expressions now, and adding voices also created a large impact. This was my interpretation of the characters at the start, but since the original game required the player to imagine the type of reactions the characters would have, I think that this caused there to be different images of the characters. As time passed, I’m sure that those images of the characters had changed as well. I think that the errors in each individual player’s interpretation is in itself an interesting part of the game.

—Jessie has a lot of scenes in the Remake and has become quite a popular character. Were her scenes planned from the beginning, or were they something that was added midway through development?

Nomura: It was planned from the beginning. However, I did not expect her to be this popular though!

—The three new characters in Wall Market, Andrea Rhodea, Madam M, and Chocobo Sam, left quite an impression. What was created first, the characters’ personalities or their designs? Also, how did the concept of the Massage Parlour come about?

Nomura: At first, the characters’ personalities weren’t that detailed. We didn’t plan for their designs to be that rich either. However, I think that the voices and acting played a great role for them. In regards to the hand massage, in a city like that, well, the maturity rating would probably go up, so we couldn’t go further with what we had.

—Characters such as Leslie and Kyrie appeared in the light novels, but what was the background on bringing them into the Remake? For example, was it for fan service or something else?

Nomura: Since the stories are part of the Compilation, Nojima-san and myself had plans for them to be included from the beginning. We thought that it would be natural for them to appear in that time and place within the story, so we decided to leave them there. In regards to what happens to them after the events in the Remake, I recommend that players read the light novel “Final Fantasy 7 TURKS: The Kids Are All Right.”

—In regards to the battle system, it contains a fusion of both command and action elements, and each character has a different fighting style. By choosing different character moves, players are able to form various effective strategies, making for a very refreshing experience. Also, the acting and conversations that the characters have during battle also gives a fresh spin on each battle. I’m sure that this was made possible by trial and error, but what was the most difficult part in doing all of this?

Nomura: A real time action battle requires a sense of nervousness and realism, but we couldn’t discard the form and battle of the original game’s command RPG style. As a result, we went through a lot of trial and error to find a perfect harmony for the two. We decided early on to allow for a slow motion sequence to take place to allow players the advantage of being able to select their actions, but there was a long period of time that we couldn’t do it properly. It was largely thanks to the staff for tying in the ATB system to perfect this as well.

—Lastly, is there anything you would like to say to the readers?

Nomura: We know that everyone wants the next installment to be released quickly. We would also like to deliver it as soon as possible. Since we were able to see the line of quality from the first installment, we hope to make the next installment even better in quality that will make for an even greater experience. We hope to release it as soon as possible, so please wait a bit more. I think we can clearly convey the direction when we officially announce the next installment, so we hope you can look forward to it!

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PRODUCER YOSHINORI KITASE INTERVIEW

—From the time that the game was announced at E3 during 2015, the world focused their attention on the game, and after releasing footage of the game’s progress through a promotional video at E3 during 2019, the expectations from the fans has only increased. I’m sure you felt quite a lot of pressure at that time, but now that the game is finally released, how do you feel?

Kitase: I feel relieved that we were able to successfully approach both veteran fans who have been there since the beginning as well as new fans. I feel like right now, the expectations are even higher than before the game was released, and that gives us a lot of motivation to develop the next installment.

—Before the game was released, you mentioned that the hurdle that you needed to overcome was that of the player’s imagination that they have constructed in their minds for the Remake. After seeing the reception from the players post-release, do you feel that you have overcome that hurdle?

Kitase: Well, not just for me, but the power of the entire development staff combined was great. Most of them were fans from the beginning who also played the original game when it first came out. Thanks to that, they knew what kind of image fans probably had for the Remake, and I think we were able to overcome the hurdles that way.

—The game was released worldwide during a time when COVID-19 was affecting the entire world, but did that have any impacts on the game’s development? Also, before the game was released, promotional events were cancelled and the distribution of the game was also shipped ahead of schedule. There seemed to have been a lot of hard decisions to make depending on the situation…

Kitase: In terms of development, we only had the debugging phase left, which meant that the game was pretty much already complete, so there was not much impact from the virus. However, it was a pity that many promotional events were cancelled, and people were not able to really celebrate the release of the game. Luckily, through the means of the downloadable version, we were able to deliver some fun during a very stressful time where it was hard for people to even leave their homes. I hope that we were able to give them at least a moment of reprieve through the game.

—In regards to the FFVII Remake production, was there anything you were particular about?

Kitase: In the latter half of the story, there’s a scene where Cloud and Sephiroth have a confrontation. I wanted the scenery of that segment to show a starry sky that represents the overall themes of FFVII, and the art design team was able to bring that image to life.

Kitase: That’s all thanks to the careful attention that the Co-Directors Hamaguchi and Toriyama as well as the development staff put in making this game. I started game development ever since the Super Famicom console, so I’m used to the type of “cut” and “reuse” way of production. However, the new generation of games require a sense of reality, so that former way of developing games has become obsolete. The current generation of game development staff have that new type of conscience when creating games, so it’s thanks to their enthusiasm that we were able to make this possible.

—I’m sure that there are several younger development staff who never played the original FFVII, so were there any instances where there was a bit of a generation gap?

Kitase: Not really. But I guess when we wanted to give an example from a movie or something, we wouldn’t bring up a reference from an old movie that they probably wouldn’t know (laughs).

—Are there any elements from either the Original game or part of the Compilation that you wanted to make a reality or something that you wanted to have in the past game that was then added into this game?

Kitase: I suppose that would be making everything in 3D with a 360 degree scope of the world. Especially when you’re looking up into the sky of Midgar or looking down towards the slums, I’m really glad that we were able to give the city a sense of realism.

—As a gamer, was there anything in particular from FF7R that surprised or impressed you?

Kitase: This is connected with my answer to the previous question, but yes, being able to look above towards the sky from the slums, thinking “wow, you can see the sky after all!” For 23 years, I imagined the slums to be under a lot of pressure and cloaked in darkness. In the Remake, you can see a different side of the city during the day that you could not see in the original game, and I thought that was really fun.

—You were involved with the initial level design of the Sector 5 Mako Reactor from when the characters infiltrate the reactor to their escape, but were there any other parts that you also were involved in?

Kitase: I was also in charge of the initial stage level design for the scene at the top of the Shinra Building. The scene where Cloud is about to fall off the rooftop but is saved by Tifa is a callback and answer to the Sector 5 Mako Reactor scene where Tifa couldn’t save Cloud from falling.

Kitase: Director Nomura as well as Co-Director Hamaguchi and Toriyama hoped to be able to keep all the parts of the original that fans have come to love. However, we also wanted to add several surprises that would balance out the story too. I’m sure there are people who wish to experience the exact same story and relive memories. However, if we were to do that, then all we would be doing is just adding to the original experience, which would cause the Remake to lose its significance. I think that we were able to successfully revive the story by adding new elements for the new generation of a “New FFVII.”

—Lastly, is there anything you would like to say to the readers?

Kitase: The new FFVII’s story has only just begun. Please look forward to the story from here on out! --------- CO-DIRECTOR TORIYAMA MOTOMU INTERVIEW

—Now that the game has been released, how are you feeling?

Toriyama: I’m really glad that despite the abrupt change in lifestyle [due to COVID-19], this game is able to deliver entertainment to people around the world in the comfort of their own homes. There was some skeptism from fans when we announced before the release of the game that the FF7 Remake will only take place in Midgar, but because the game dug so deeply into the world of FF7, I was relieved to hear that a lot of people were extremely satisfied with the game.

Toriyama: We thought about how we can revive the entity of FFVII using the latest technology as well as capturing the richness of the original. The time it took to oversee one scene or area was great, and in order to do so, we needed much more staff than what we had back in the day. Each and every staff had their own things they were particular about, and we were able to find a balance and successfully craft this game.

—Since you were involved with the development of the game, was there anything you were concerned about?

Toriyama: Since we had to replace many things with a new portrayal, I was quite particular that the essence of FFVII still remained true throughout. I think that if you had played the original game too, you would know which parts were changed and which parts were left in. However, I wanted to make sure that the events of the Remake flowed in a natural way with both new and familiar elements that you can enjoy. I’m happy to know that the Remake is able to add an even more vivid experience to go along with your memories of FFVII.

—I’m sure that there are several younger development staff who never played the original FFVII, so were there any instances where there was a bit of a generation gap?

Toriyama: There are actually a lot of staff who have played the original FFVII and got the opportunity to work in this industry. There are also staff who are more versed in the original game than even the members of staff who worked on the original game, and many of those staff wanted to make an adaptation that kept faithful to the original. In terms of keeping things as traditional as possible, the staff who worked on the original game, myself included, had the notion of “making a new game that no one has ever seen before.” With that conscience in mind, we were able to decide the type of direction we wanted to go in the Remake.

Toriyama: In terms of music, FFVII is a rather cinematic series, but in the original game due to disc space and time restraints, we weren’t able to include a movie-worthy soundtrack. However, we were able to challenge ourselves with the Remake. We wanted to have specific songs that played throughout the entire game that would also go along with the scenes, so the Remake gave us a chance to be able to try this out. With this type of composing, we didn’t really have a specific detailed list, so we didn’t count exactly how many songs we created until we realized that the soundtrack itself would span to seven discs, making it a huge volume of songs (laughs).

—As a gamer, was there anything in particular from FF7R that surprised or impressed you?

Toriyama: After the game was released, I saw a gaming review website capture all the little details of various landscapes in the game, from the posters and billboards to the train time schedules, close inspections of the buildings, pretty much everything that showed the lifestyles of people living in Midgar. Although I’m glad that people were able to deeply observe the details we put in, I can’t help but see some flaws, so it kind of gives me pressure to make sure that the next installment will have even more perfected details (laughs).

—Compared to 23 years ago, from the addition of voices in conversations to a change of design, trends have changed. Was it difficult to achieve a balance of retaining the essence of the original game but still representing it for a new generation?

Toriyama: We wanted to have the game be fully voiced including the NPC within the city, so we were careful when putting in dialogue that would sound natural. We left in some funny lines spoken from the original game’s NPC too, but since there were way more NPCs in the Remake compared to the original, we made sure to find a good balance where those lines wouldn’t be buried among the other spoken dialogue.

Toriyama: For the Remake, the voice acting was added after we had finished creating the cutscenes, and I think that the character’s performance really shined through from the work that the actors and actresses have done that brought out each character’s charm. During recording, Barret had an unexpected continuity that we pushed further, and the results really brought out his character very well.

—In regards to seeing a brand new side of Cloud, the peak of it would probably be the dance sequence at the Honey Bee Inn. Was this scene planned from the beginning?

Toriyama: We strongly did not want to leave out Cloud’s crossdressing scene but instead wanted to create a concept that would make it stand out even more in the Remake. We decided to make Wall Market a huge entertainment district, and we were very enthusiastic in making the Honey Bee Inn even more of an entertainment hotspot in the Remake. I actually helped create the Honey Bee Inn for the original game, so it was easy for me to reimagine the place for the Remake. While still retaining some elements from the original, we were able to give it a huge makeover.

—The Shinra Mascot dog “Stamp” appears in various locations, even on a snack package blowing in the wind in towards the ending with Zack. Was the character of Stamp originally created in the beginning stages of development?

Toriyama: The dog Stamp is a very important symbol that was planned since the beginning. Stamp’s use was determined along with the game design. AVALANCHE also uses him as their symbol, so there is a good meaning to him that we included to have him stand out. However, the Stamp that appears in the scene with Zack is a different breed, so please pay attention to that.

—I was quite surprised that Chadley turned out to be what he was in the story, but who’s idea was it to create this character?

Toriyama: Chadley is a new character that was not in the original game, so it was the scenario team who decided on creating this character. There are a lot of contents regarding the game’s difficulty levels and clearing the battle reports, so we decided to have Cloud be able to encounter Chadley throughout the entire game. I haven’t finished clearing the HARD mode yet, but I hope that those who haven’t cleared everything yet can challenge themselves with this!

—The new character Roche left quite an impact, but he’s an eccentric one that only appears in Chapter 4 and nowhere else. What was the purpose of his character, and will he appear in the next installment?

Toriyama: We had initially drawn up a concept of having Roche appear at the last battle on the Midgar Highway, but we thought that he might ruin the serious mood of the ending sequence, so we scrapped that idea. We also thought to put him in as a boss battle in the Chapter 14 slums, but since you can’t really race around on a motorbike in the slums, we unfortunately could not make it work. Roche’s spontaneity is one of his character traits that stands out though, so there’s a high chance that he’ll appear in the next installment (laughs).

—In the Remake, the characters have a lot of banter when they’re walking around or fighting battles, and the dialogue is not always the same either. Did you oversee the types of conversations that were put in?

Toriyama: All scenarios were checked and supervised by me and Nojima-san. We actually had a lot more lines prepared in the script for dialogue spoken by characters in boss battles, but somewhere around the middle of production, we eventually cut out the frequency of giving out hints and instead left it to the players to think about what to do. This in turn caused us to cut a lot of dialogue out.

—Are there any specific episodes, scenes, or dialogue that you were interested in or wanted to include?

Toriyama: The AVALANCHE base at the bottom of Seventh Heaven in the original game was an interesting area that left an impression on me, but since Cloud is not very close with AVALANCHE in the Remake, we wanted to show that distance between them, which made us leave out that scene. Although I really wanted to have Barret punching that sandbag in the Remake, I had to restrain myself (laughs).

—Lastly, is there anything you would like to say to the readers?

Toriyama: Even though the first installment of the “FFVII Remake” has ended, the story has only just begun. While listening to the voices of the fans, we also hope to make the next installments something that would exceed your expectations. I personally also played the original game again after finishing the Remake. While waiting for the next installment, I hope you can enjoy the differences in the Remake’s portrayal of Midgar and also have fun imagining what kinds of things lie ahead in the next game too!

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CO-DIRECTOR HAMAGUCHI NAOKI INTERVIEW

—Now that the game has been released, how are you feeling?

Hamaguchi: I felt very relieved after seeing the user feedback after the game was released. I fully joined the development team for FF7R in 2017 when the fans had been waiting for this game for quite some time already. So I made it my mission to ensure that fans do not wait longer than 3 years for the completion of the game. FF7 is a game that many people have come to love, so there was a real sense of responsibility to carry, but even so, the development team staff is composed of people who are extremely passionate about FF7, so we were able to enjoy making this game while progressing on its development.

—Since you were involved with the development of the game, was there anything you were concerned about?

Hamaguchi: What was constantly said to the team was that we must “respect the original game.” We were not creating a new game that is only inspired by the characters and world of FFVII, but we strove to create a game where the elements of the original are remade using the latest game design and graphics, making it feel “nostalgic yet new.” If we were to stray far away from the source material, then people might think “this is not the FFVII that I know,” so we tried to follow the original story but added details that we could not add 20 years ago using the latest technology. With that, we were able to focus on enriching the story to create an experience that is still “the FFVII that l know, but with a lot more new things waiting to be discovered.”

Hamaguchi: The Remake was made possible by the enthusiasm from the entire staff. During the production of this game, the task division between the development staff was even more than another Final Fantasy numbered game. For example, a person in charge of location would usually be a level designer that would spend 2-3 years on a single location’s design, execution, and then implementation, and we had specific staff designated to work on all the locations as well. For battle parts, we had a single person in charge of 2-3 bosses at a time, and a level designers also oversaw everything from design to implementation. With this scheme, we were able to have each game designer focus on only the parts that they are designated with, which allowed them to be enthusiastic and particular with the production of their areas. However, because of this, each game designer felt very strongly of their work that they poured their all into, so in order to not lose satisfaction, wemade it a priority to view the contents as a whole within the team. By doing this, we were able to combine everyone’s vision into the end product.

—Without having the battle system be solely either a Command RPG or Action style, it must have been challenging to fuse the two together. During development, there must have been some trial and error to get it right, but was there any part that was specifically concerning or challenging?

Hamaguchi: One of the most particular parts was how we were going to incorporate the ATB Battle System. We didn’t want to incorporate a completely new battle style that was different than the original, so we were inspired by the original FF7’s ATB battle system to create a new and improved one that also works in real time. Of course, I’m sure that the action elements we added gives off a very fresh impression, but the root of the system is from the ATB battle system, allowing us to incorporate a sense of nostalgia to the battle system. The part we worked extremely hard on was how to fuse together action and command style elements. Many of the development team staff including myself have a long history working with command RPGs, so we are very confident with that type of battle style in that field. However, when we tried adding action elements in, there was a sense of discord within the battle system we had.

The part we were stuck on was that implementing a command system will cause the the user to have too much information in regards to fighting strategy, and that would only cause issues if we were also going to add real time action options too. When we were doing trial and error to figure out how to draw the line between how many action and command elements we could add, Battle Director Endou Teruki was able to join our team. He is extremely versed with action battle systems and how to develop them, so as soon as he saw what we had created, he immediately pointed out that we were lacking features in regards to the action elements of the battle system. Since we were having trouble figuring out a balance between the action and command elements, we couldn’t really answer what we were lacking since we just simply added in action elements, so we were not able to create a very refreshing experience. Luckily, Endou was able to concentrate on the action parts and balanced out the battle system with fast paced command RPG strategy as well as action elements, which is what you see in the finished product.

—In terms of creating an action battle system, I’m sure there were concerns about the increasing difficulty of that fighting style. For those who are not fond of action battle systems, there’s also the option of “CLASSIC Mode,” but was there anything else you were particularly conscious about?

Hamaguchi: For those who only wanted to enjoy the game’s story, we implemented EASY Mode, for those who wanted to enjoy the command RPG style of fighting, we also created the CLASSIC mode, so there are different play styles you can choose from. Since the “CLASSIC mode” was something we tried for the first time, we were excited to hear the reactions of the players, and I think the reviews have been favorable. We heard comments from users who enjoyed the Normal mode’s difficulty level but in the CLASSIC mode style, so we will refer to their feedback in the future as well.

—Since the game’s release, I’m sure that most people have viewed the battle system in a very favorable light. What do you think about the reactions that you have seen thus far?

Hamaguchi: We feel that we have delivered the exact type of battle experience that users can accept. I think this is thanks to the way we were able to create a system that not only reimagines the ATB battle system in real time form, but we also pays homage to the Command RPG style, which leaves a sense of nostalgia while giving a fresh new experience to the battle style. I’m sure there are a lot of people who are interested in what kind of battle system we have in store for the next installment too. We would like the battle system to be even more customizable with more action and command strategies that users can curate into their own playing style, giving an even newer experience, so please look forward to that!

—It seems that the level cap at 50 has some limitations in regards to your status attributes and range, and since various weapons have their own strengths, it seems like you put thought into balancing out battles. In regular RPGs, characters grow and their weapons become stronger, but it feels like this was done in moderation. Was this balance something that the development team had planned from the beginning?

Hamaguchi: When we were stuck on how to create the battle system, we made changes to optimize the balance of the battle system. We wanted a balance that also incorporated the original FF7’s customizable options with materia, and Battle Director Endou also had the same thoughts. However, if we allowed players to get as many materia as they would like, then they could technically give the same set of materia to each character, which would defeat the purpose of giving each character their own unique abilities. Thus, we decided to put limits on the amount of attributes you can have. Moreso than putting a moderation on gaining strength, we wanted players to have fun with the strategies that they could incorporate by using different materia or weapons. If you were to redo a battle, you could try other ways of setting up your weapons and materia to create a stress free battle, and I thought that was an important function to have.

—Boss battles within the game have different stages where the attacks or field changes, such as the Sword Dance battle that splits between two parties during the fight. Was this concept of having battles be set up in different stages as the fight progressed something that was decided during the beginning of production?

Hamaguchi: That’s right. I told the team during the beginning that boss battles would be executed out in phases. Many of the bosses within each chapter contain some of the most exciting reveals, so we wanted players to be able to feel immersed within the story even through the boss battles. In order to do that, we constructed each boss battle to have several different phases where the battle strategy changes and also focuses on the story at the same time. We also paid attention to the party structure. In particular, we spent a lot of time and effort to solidify the party structure during the battle with Sephiroth. The battle with the Whisper Harbinger that leads to the climax fight with Sephiroth is one that changes automatically as does the structure of the party you are fighting with, so the protagonists need to work together in order to challenge their own fate.

However, we felt that if we were to do the same type of structure during Sephiroth’s battle, then it might become tedious to the player. For example, if we were to take away one of the protagonists out of the four, then the fans of that protagonist might feel let down. Because of that, we decided that the characters who join you during the Sephiroth battle will depend on how you fought during the Whisper Harbinger battle. However, in order to do this, we would have to create a ton of cutscenes depending on the order that the characters appear in, and even now I remember the look on the cutscene team member’s faces when I proposed the idea and the blank stares that I received (laughs). Because the Final Fantasy Series is one that is known for having a large amount of cutscenes, I am really grateful for the cutscene team member’s assistance in not just the Sephiroth battle scene, but for working so hard on all cutscenes within the series too.

—There are weapons, accessories, materia, and items that were added into the Remake that were not present in the original game, but was there any particular reason for doing this?

Hamaguchi: Right before the game went gold, I actually made an absurd request to the team to add the “Pedometer” materia. You get this materia at the start of Chapter 14, and since you’re there to help people out with odds and ends within the Sector 5 and Sector 6 slums, you would need to walk around the areas a lot. Since you had visited these areas within Chapter 8 and Chapter 9 already, there wouldn’t be many changes, so I thought to give players a reason for walking around these places again by adding in this materia. I actually originally called the materia the “Step” materia, but I noticed that Toriyama changed the name to the “Pedometer” materia instead (laughs). I was reminded of it again when I saw the strategy book refer to that name.

—Is there any specific monster enemy or battle (whether it be within the Colosseum or Battle Simulator) that piqued your interest?

Hamaguchi: The “Level 7 Top Secret Battle” has quite a shock factor. The person in charge of battle planning asked me, “Does it make sense for Bahamut to summon Ifrit?” Since they are fighting in a virtual reality, it wouldn’t be a problem, so I answered “Yeah, go for it!” without thinking too much about it. However, when I was doing a play check for the difficulty level of the battle, I remember being shocked (laughs). When that happens, you’d probably panic and think that you should defeat Ifrit first, but it’s actually more advantageous to focus on attacking Bahamut instead. This battle was the most difficult one for me and left quite an impression.

—I’m sure that there are several younger development staff who never played the original FFVII, so were there any instances where there was a bit of a generation gap?

Hamaguchi: Since the original game was so widely loved by fans everywhere, there were a lot of younger staff members who were scared of making changes. On the other hand, Producer Kitase wanted big changes (laughs). Nomura and I saw the Remake as an homage to the original game, so if we were to change anything, we made sure that it would be something planned with a specific reason that fans could accept.

—Did you have any ideas or wishes that you were entertaining by yourself that was then made a reality in this game?

Hamaguchi: It’s not something I was entertaining for a while, but having an automatic weapon growth system was something that I focused on before working on FF7R since I was on the development team for the “Mobius Final Fantasy” game, which left a strong impression on me. Since a smartphone game operates in a way that you return to it on a daily basis, lots of things are automated as much as possible to create a smooth experience. There’s also a card synthesis system within the game that allows for an automated way to synthesize your cards, so that was a point that I thought would be nice to have in FF7R where weapons could automatically level up as well. I’m always thinking about the consumer side when developing games, and being able to see customer reactions in real time, such as when I was developing smartphone games, gave me an environment to try out a lot of ideas I had. I think that was a great experience for me.

—As a gamer, was there anything in particular from FF7R that surprised or impressed you?

Hamaguchi: Although I myself was involved too, I’m still very impressed that we were able to successfully create a game from start to finish without making compromises to any of the large amount of data we had. This is all thanks to not only Nomura, Toriyama, and other directors such as me, but also to the game designers, graphics team, sound team, system staff, and more. All of us had various responsibilities as creators, and it’s because of the best efforts of everyone that we were able to make this game possible. I’m personally very excited to make the next game with the same team members again!

—FFVII Remake is highly praised as a game with amazing quality with the latest technology, but was there anything that was challenging or something that you did not personally oversee but was still impressed with the outcome?

Hamaguchi: Seeing the world of FFVII open up through its story is one of the highlights that makes the game so enjoyable, but the user experience and story immersion could be greatly impacted with too many loading screens and wait times. We therefore kept a technical eye on the loading system since the beginning. In order to do this, we aligned the data with each situation so that it could simultaneously load, which allowed us to not have the loading screen appear during the middle of the chapter. During the last cutscene of each chapter, the next chapter’s data would already be loading in the background, which allowed for the load screen between chapters to also be as short as possible. We also added tips to read on the load screen, but because the loading times are so short, it’s also difficult to read all of them. It made me cry out with joy!

—Lastly, is there anything you would like to say to the readers?

Hamaguchi: The first installment of the “FFVII Remake Project” was centered around Midgar, and we strived to recreate a Midgar that you could not experience in the original story, showcasing the hustle and bustle of the lives of the people there as well as the environment. The next installment will then shift to the other parts of the world since the characters have escaped from Midgar in the story. We hope to create a game that allows you to experience the charm and allure of the world of FFVII from the various lives of the people as well as the environments that will be present. Production for the next installment is already under way, and our team is putting their all into the advancement of the game. Although there is still a wait, we hope that you can look forward to what we have in store!

#final fantasy 7 #ff7r #final fantasy 7 remake #ff7 #final fantasy vii remake #ffvii #final fantasy #cloud #aerith #tifa #barret #red xiii #reno #rude #tseng #rufus #my translations

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gaemkyuu · 3 years

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Of Kings & Queens (Part One)

Warnings: none! A/N: Here’s the first part! This is mostly context to the story, with a sneak peak of Prince Charlie! I’ll upload a little more tomorrow! AU!Prince Charlie Gillespie x Fictional Character Disclaimer: This is a FICITONAL writing piece! In no way do I claim characters in this piece act this way in real life.

Masterlist *now taking requests ;)

Part 1/Part 2/Part 3/Part 4/Part 5/Part 6

Four Kingdoms stood strong. North, East, South and West. Four Royal Families would unite the land. The Blood of Gillespie would rule the cold North, bountiful with forestry and game. The Blood of Shada would rule the Eastern coast and land, mastering the stormy seas and its’ treasures. The Blood of Joyners would rule the hot Southern lands, gathering the resources for petrol that kept the Kingdoms running. The Blood of Lee would rule the golden coast of the Western lands, providing crops and livestock to feed the people. In each Kingdom, a Ruler to bring prosperity and peace to all its’ people.

Dawn was breaking and people were already moving busily about the Western Kingdom. As more people woke, the excitement in the air increased, for today was a special day. Festivities would start early in the day and go late into the night as the Western Kingdom celebrated the coming of age the Princess. Not only was it the Princess’ birthday, it also signified that the Princess was now officially on the Royal Market, searching for a partner to become King of the Western Kingdom. Tonight’s celebration at the castle would bring people from all over the nation, including the royal families from the Eastern, Southern, and Northern kingdoms. Farmers harvested and packed their crops and livestock, Bakers made fresh delights by the dozens, Florists put out their best and brightest flowers and the Merchants polished their wares. This special occasion would bring people from all over the Four Kingdoms to their stores in celebration and vacation. All the work that was being put into the celebration brought the citizens together and united them on this special day.

Well... At least the citizens were excited...

The Princess was awoken by her best friend and handmaiden, much to her displeasure. She groaned and pulled the covers over her head as the curtains in her room were parted, trying to ignore the hustle and bustle going around her. She knew what day it was, and this made her want to stay in bed for much longer. She even debated not getting up at all. As her handmaiden made herself busy and gave directions to other servants that had entered her room, the princess pulled a pillow over her head, trying to make it clear that she had no intention of getting up. With a heavy sigh, her confidant gave the other servants orders and ushered them out before shutting the door softly behind them.

“Liv. I love you and you know how I feel about today, but I would really appreciate it if you would cooperate so we don’t have the queen on our butts this early” the princess groaned and her best friend pulled the covers off her body. She flinched at the bright sunlight streaming into her room.

“I’m not getting up today Sav. It’s not happening” Savannah shook her head and rolled her eyes at her friend. She knew that Olivia could be quite the drama queen, but today she needed her to cooperate so that she wouldn’t fall behind schedule. Savannah glanced at the clock, already knowing that the extra 15 minutes she allotted was now gone.

“Liv, unless you want to bathe in a cold bath, you will get up or so help me I will dump ice water on you myself!” Olivia groaned and finally sat up looking at her best friend with disdain. “Listen, I know you don’t want to do Today. I get it. But you don’t need another reason to get on the nerves of the King and Queen today” Savannah’s voice sounded slightly distressed and Olivia felt a little guilty at her dramatization this morning.

Olivia and Savannah were best friends ever since she could remember. Savannah was the only friend she had growing up in the palace and was the only friend her parents let her have that wasn’t Royalty. Sure, there were the Duchesses and Countesses of the smaller lands in the Western Kingdom, but Olivia always found them snooty or rude. Savannah’s family had been helping the royal family for generations and they were integral parts of the inner workings of the palace. Naturally, when Savannah’s parents were busy at work Savannah would wander the halls until she found Olivia. The two were like sisters and the King and Queen appreciated the hard work her family put in to serving the Royal family.

And while the Royal family paid them handsomely while providing them lodging, Olivia couldn’t help but feel a little guilty at times when the difference in their status showed. Olivia rarely wore the same dress twice, while Savannah had a very modest and small wardrobe. Olivia had a private instructor, while Savannah went to the school with other children. But Savannah never really cared and that’s what Olivia loved about her. She was a true and honest friend who Olivia felt safe confiding in.

“Sorry Sav. I didn’t mean to make this any harder on you than it already has been” Olivia offered her friend a smile, patting the spot beside her on the bed. “Think you can spend a few minutes off your feet? Debrief me on the day if you will?” Savannah greatly accepted the spot, giving her a knowing look and a big sigh.

“Well Princess-” Olivia glared at Savannah at the title. “You need to get into the baths and get clean so I can do your hair and make up before the lady the Queen hired arrives. There is no way I’m letting you face the neighbouring nations’ heirs with makeup and hair that I don’t approve of.” Olivia laughed at Savannah’s possessiveness.

“Do we know if the royal families are coming or just their heirs?” Olivia gave a stretch, preparing herself to start the day.

“To my knowledge, just the heirs... But I hear that Prince Charles is quite handsome!” Olivia rolled her eyes as Savannah winked at her. “What? I can’t help it! You hear the chitter chatter in the palace halls. They arrived yesterday and some of the other servants have already been gushing about him. He’s apparently really charming and great husband material” Savannah saw the look of defeat briefly cross her friend’s eyes, before covering it up with an annoyed sigh. “But enough of that. Let’s get you cleaned and dressed and ready to greet our guests.”

***

“Alright Liv, take a deep breath and hold it, I’m pulling up the zipper!” Olivia did as she was told, while Savannah pulled up the zipper to her dress. She was already dreading the fact that she would have to wear the elaborate garb for several hours. Although the light blue gown was absolutely stunning and represented her fashion sense too, she didn’t expect it to come in several pieces. After putting on two layers of skirt, she had a separate top that needed to be zipped up and a cape draped over her shoulders. She could already feel the weight of the material weighing her down a bit and she sighed at the fact that they hadn’t put on her jewelry yet. Savannah and her helpers busied themselves about putting on a bracelet here and a necklace there. Another girl was putting on her earrings while the other made small hems to her dress. Olivia felt like the dolls that her and Savannah played with as little girls.

“Voila! I’ve outdone myself!” Savannah exclaimed, admiring her bestfriend’s transformation, stepping away from her so that she could see herself in the mirror. As much as Olivia didn’t want to like this moment, she couldn’t stop the smile that graced her face. Her best friend had listened to her every request about her dress. Her mother insisted that her first dress be floor length, modest and a Queen Ann neckline. She requested that the dress be midnight blue with the lace accents to be gold. Her mother criticized her colour choice, saying that dark colours were for the evening, not the morning. Olivia argued that if she had no say in the dress at all, she would go naked, a response in which her mother glared angrily at her. However, as she looked at herself in the mirror, she realized that Savannah had taken her mother’s requests and her requests and blended them together. She had a high waisted, A-line skirt that held the princess look her mother wanted, but it wasn’t so big that Olivia felt like a pastry. The Queen Ann neckline was a dark blue mesh with gold lace accents that extended into long sleeves for her arms. Her bodice held very little decoration as the bottom of her dress held all the royal ornate details. The velvet floor length cape was held together by a golden broach.

As per tradition, Olivia wore her family jewels. The gold diamond festoon necklace sat proudly upon her collar and the gold and sapphire earrings were prominent but not over done. A small dainty gold bracelet sat on her wrist and her family ring decorated her right hand. Her hair was neatly pulled back into a loosened braided low bun with the occasional curl framing her face.

“You’ve done a fine job Savannah” the girls jumped at the voice of the Queen. Quickly turning around, Savannah curtsied to her majesty and Olivia followed with a smaller curtsy. “Savannah, could you please grab the tiara out of the case?”

“Yes, your majesty” Savannah hurried over to the velvet case on the vanity and presented it to the Queen. The small but simple gold tiara sparkled in the light of the room. As the Queen gently picked the tiara up, Olivia bowed, lowering her head, a gesture she was all too familiar with. Her mother placed her tiara upon her head and held her face in her hands. She kissed her daughter on the head, careful not to get any lipstick on her.

“The gods have been great to bless me with a daughter as beautiful as you.” Olivia smiled at her mom, not expecting the sudden emotional tenderness she displayed. “Happy Birthday my dearest. Promise me you’ll try to behave yourself today?” Olivia scoffed and rolled her eyes.

“I’ll try” her mother chuckled softly.

��Just like your father... All I ask is that you give today a chance to be great. You might be surprised at the unexpected events that may present themselves to you” Olivia could never see herself being as polished as her mother. She knew her mother had her best interest at heart, but Olivia couldn’t help but feel like her mother was forcing her to fit into traditional roles of the Kingdom. “If you’ll excuse me, I must be on my way to the throne room. I shall see you shortly Olivia. Savannah, please ensure that the Princess does not stall. I would hate to have her tardy for her grand entrance.”

“Yes your highness!” Savannah curtsied as her mother and the remaining servants exited, leaving the two of them in the room. “Ready to go my lady?”

“Savannah, you know you can drop the formalities around me.” Olivia stepped off the round fitting platform, Savannah catching her arm as Olivia stumbled for a moment, not used to wearing heels. “It makes me feel weird!”

“I know, but we are going to be around tons of people today and most of them would probably have my head if I called you by name in front of them. I’ll be at your side the entire time, but when others are around, you have to remember I’m your attendant” Olivia sighed in slight disappointment, but she knew her friend was right.

“How is it that you’re not the Princess and I am? You’d be way better at this than I am” Savannah giggled at her remarks and dusted her dress off before they opened the door. They knew that her royal guards were right behind it and that as soon as they exited the room, their dynamic had to change.

“Please, I can’t hide my feelings as easily as you. When I think someone is an idiot, it’s clear all over my face and I don’t even notice it!” they shared a laugh as they opened the door and officially started the day.

But they didn’t expect to see a brown haired man zoom by them in hysterical laughter as a taller blonde man chased after him.

“Charlie! Get back here with my crown!” and the two disappeared around the corner. Olivia blinked in shocked, trying to process whether the scene in front of her happened or not. As her and Savannah shared a look and shrugged their shoulders, they realized that today was going to indeed be very eventful.

tag list: @ifilwtmfc

#charlie gillespie #charlie gillespie x reader #charlie gillespie fanfiction #charlie gillespie imagines #owen joyner #jeremy shada

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clonewarsarchives · 3 years

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Inside 'Star Wars: The Clone Wars'

By: Gerri Miller (original article link on howstuffworks)

Sources

George Lucas interviewed August 4, 2008

Dave Filoni interviewed September 11, 2008

The sci-fi phenomenon that began more than 30 years ago with a movie about a galaxy long ago and far, far away has expanded exponentially ever since with sequels, prequels, books, games and animated spinoffs. Although the animated "Star Wars: The Clone Wars" movie, released this summer, has to date grossed a less than stellar $34 million, it was an offshoot of creator George Lucas' mission to create a TV series, and it served its purpose as a promotional tool for the weekly "Clone Wars" episodes that premiere on Cartoon Network Oct. 3, 2008.

Focused on the conflict briefly referred to in the original "Star Wars," the galactic civil war takes place in the period between "Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones" and "Episode III: Revenge of the Sith." The Clone Wars pit the Grand Army of the Republic led by the Jedi Knights against the Separatists and their Droid Army, led by Count Dooku, a Jedi turned Sith Lord aligned with the evil Darth Sidious. Many of the characters from the "Star Wars" universe are involved, including Yoda, Obi-Wan Kenobi and young Anakin Skywalker, before he was tempted to the Dark Side and became Darth Vader.

"I was lamenting the fact that in 'Episode II,' I started the Clone Wars, and in 'Episode III,' I ended the Clone Wars, and I never actually got to do anything on the Clone Wars," says Lucas. "It's like skipping over World War II."

To remedy that omission, he tapped Dave Filoni, an animator (Nickelodeon's "Avatar: the Last Airbender" series) and passionate "Star Wars" fan, to bring "The Clone Wars" to TV.

Ensconced at Big Rock Ranch, near Lucas' Skywalker Ranch headquarters in Marin County, Cali., Filoni and his team of artists and computer animators are making 22 episodes in season one and have nearly two more seasons written.

"We're way ahead. We've been doing this ever since I finished 'Revenge of the Sith,'" says Lucas, who hopes to do at least 100 installments.

He and Filoni collaborate on everything from story to design to execution in translating the "Star Wars" universe for television. It's a daunting creative, technical and logistic task, as we'll explain in the following sections.

Building the Universe

How do you scale down an IMAX-size spectacle for television and still have it make an impact, especially on a small screen budget? That's just one of the problems Dave Filoni has to solve.

"'Star Wars' is very famous for the scale of it, and how convincing it looks. So when you're doing a weekly television series, you have to figure out how to do things on that level," he notes. "Sometimes it forces you to be creative and come up with solutions that are better than if you can shoot everything you want," he continues, preferring to consider budgetary constraints a creative incentive rather than a limitation. "The team here is challenged to come up with these giant battles. We haven't shied away from anything."

While he did some of the initial character design, subsequently, Filoni has spent most of his time supervising other artists and animators, who number around 70 in-house and another 80 or so at facilities in Singapore and Taipei.

"Everything is written here, and the story and design and editing are all done here. The animation and lighting are done overseas, and sometimes some modeling as well," he outlines.

"I meet with George to talk about the episodes and he hands out a lot of the storylines and main ideas for the stories. I'll draw while he's talking and show him the sketch," Filoni continues. "That way we communicate right off the bat about what something might look like."

At any given time, the director notes, episodes are in various stages of completion, "from designing to working on a final cut, or adding sound and color-correction. I have four episodic directors to help me, who each have an episode they're managing."

Rather than use computer animation to duplicate the live-action films' characters or continue in the very stylized vein of the 2004-2005 "Clone Wars" micro-series, "We kind of shot for the middle," says Filoni, who endeavored to blend a 2-D esthetic with 3-D technology.

"The 3-D model makers and riggers who worked on the prequels dealt with the height of realism to create convincing digital characters. I knew that we weren't going to be able to do that for the series. And we wanted it to be different than a live-action feature, to get away from photo-realism. It was a choice to simplify something in the character models, the same way we would do things in a 2-D show."

So how did Filoni stay true to the "Star Wars" legacy in this newest installment? Read on to find out.

Clone Style

Taking some inspiration from the earlier cartoon series, Filoni

approached the characters as a 2-D animator would, "but stylized the face a little more. If you look at Anakin, he has certain edges and lines in his face. I would draw an edge or a line that might be unnaturally straight or curved, and that would play into the lighting of it. I tried to sculpt in 3-D the way I would draw or sculpt an image in 2-D, with shadow and light. I wanted it to look like a painting -- you see a textured, hand-painted style on every character. I have texture artists who literally paint every single character right down to their eyeball, because I wanted that human touch on everything."

Advances in computer animation have allowed Filoni to accomplish much more than he would have been able to in traditional 2-D. "For eight years I worked just with a pencil. I never touched a computer. But working with George, we try to look at computers as an incredibly advanced pencil. The technical side helps the creative, artistic side," he says.

Battles filled with huge numbers of soldiers can be rendered faster than ever before, but they still have to be created, along with every other prop and character in an enormous universe. "'Star Wars' is so complex in that you're building a whole galaxy. We go to many different planets," Filoni reminds. "So every rock, tree, blade of grass, native vehicle -- every asset -- needs design. We had to create a whole bunch of assets for each episode, and the budget goes up for each element you have. Once you build it, you have it, but we can't go to a different planet and have the same chair there," he laughs. "On a schedule where we need those things right away, it's difficult to get it all built."

Since "The Clone Wars" is chronologically sandwiched between "Clone Wars" and "Revenge of the Sith," it has been a mandate for the creators to stay consistent with the mythology. "That's probably one of the trickiest things," admits Filoni. "We always have to keep in mind what the characters are thinking and feeling at the beginning of this and at the end. You have a lot of room to play with when you're in the middle, but you have to remember what people say in the third movie. With characters like Obi-Wan or Anakin or Padme, I have to pay very careful attention that it will hook up. And then there's the expanded universe of "Star Wars" novels and video games. I try to be aware of it all and work it in, because fans really appreciate it."

Filoni hopes to attract existing fans and create new ones, especially among the younger generation, but admits doing the latter may be easier. "One thing we have that's different from any movie that came before is we're an animated series. But there's an instant reaction to the word animation that it's for kids. How you get around that is with the stories you tell. We'll have our snow battles and we'll also have our lighter 'Return of the Jedi' moments. Some episodes lean older, some younger. But in the end it has a broad appeal," he believes.

The recent "Clone Wars" movie (out on DVD Nov. 11 ) served as a stand-alone prequel to introduce the characters at this point in time. In contrast, "The series has its small arcs and shows you the war from across a broad spectrum of episodes. It's not just Anakin Skywalker's story," Filoni underlines. "We can go left or right of that plot and deal with characters we have never seen. There's a lot of material. It's a three-year period in the history of the 'Star Wars' Universe, and there are so many stories to tell. The longer it goes, the more chance we get to tell fascinating stories in that galaxy."

Character Study

"The Clone Wars" shows a different side of some of the film franchise's most iconic characters. "In a series, you can do a whole episode about a character and learn more about what they were like, which makes what happens to them a lot more poignant," explains Filoni. "We know Yoda is powerful, but how does that power develop? How does he use it? We get to go into more detail that you just couldn't do in the live action films, because they're mainly focused on Anakin."

While few of the actors from the live action movies agreed to reprise their roles in voice over for "The Clone Wars," Anthony Daniels, the original C-3PO, is the exception. "One of the special moments for me was hearing Anthony on the telephone, discussing C-3PO with me and his experiences. That really helps us round out the characters," says the director, who enjoyed similar input from Rob Coleman, the animation supervisor who worked on Yoda on the prequels.

Of the new characters not seen in the live action series, there's the alluring but venomous Asajj Ventress, a disciple of Count Dooku. "She is, of course, a villain, and fits into the structure of the Sith," Filoni elaborates. "Darth Sidious -- Senator Palpatine -- is the main bad guy, and his apprentice is Count Dooku. Dooku is training Ventress in the Dark Side. She's getting more powerful. I wanted to make her intelligent, deceptive and also kind of sexual. She's kind of a forbidden fruit -- Jedi are not supposed to get involved with the more lustful aspects of life. She adds another dynamic to the series."

On the other side of the good/evil coin is newcomer Ahsoka Tano, Anakin's teenage padawan, or apprentice. "She's Anakin's student and helps us see him as more of a hero," says Filoni. "Once he gets over his initial reaction, he takes pride in her. He's unpredictable and the Jedi know that, but he has compassion and that is used against him and it later brings him to the Dark Side."

Ahsoka was created, says Lucas, "Because I needed to mature Anakin. The best way to get somebody to become responsible and mature is to have them become a parent or a teacher. You have to think about what you're doing and set an example. You look at your behavior and the way you do things much differently. The idea was to use her to make Anakin become more mature. We've made her a more extreme version of what Anakin was- - a little out there, independent, vital and full of life, but even more so. He gets a little dose of his own medicine."

"She's been a really fun character to develop," adds Filoni, who likes Ahsoka but admits that his character tastes tend to run a bit more obscure -- his favorite is Plo Koon, "a bizarre Jedi Master. It's been fun to develop him and show his personality beyond the fact that he's bizarre looking and carries a lightsaber."

Fan Fare

Just three years ago, Filoni dressed up as Plo Koon to see an opening night showing of "Revenge of the Sith," so it's not surprising that the 34-year-old fan is still pinching himself that he has this job. "It's a very creative atmosphere," he says of Big Rock Ranch, where the lakeside setting is "meant to inspire us artistically and definitely does. A lot of the people I work with grew up with 'Star Wars,' so we have a great time. It's hard, intense work, but George is very engaged in what we're doing. What more could you ask for? I have the guy who created the 'Star Wars' universe excited and interested in what we're doing. We couldn't be happier about that."

Asked why he thinks "Star Wars" remains a fan favorite today, three decades later, Lucas says diversification is the key. "We were always able to deal with different aspects of the story in various forms and I think that keeps it alive. It is a lot of fun and it's a universe that has been created to inspire young people to exercise their imagination and inspire them to be creative, and I think that always works."

"The original 'Star Wars' had broad appeal to everybody, and it holds up so well," adds Filoni. "I think there's a timelessness to it, even though Luke looks like a kid from the '70s with that haircut. Luke is a farmer boy and Han is a cowboy. Jedi Knights are like the samurai of Japan or the knights of Europe. Those archetypes work the globe over. It's a world phenomenon that speaks to everyone. There will always be a character you can relate to."

#interview #crew #George Lucas #Dave Filoni #the first part is useless read the stuff about design and characters under cut #highlights bit for own reference

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