#and its also Its own intriguing mystery plot cause we are trying to figure out who fucked up the timeline!

[mejomonster]

I am reading a kazumaji time travel fic. I am in awe

[hopeymchope]

Parascientific Escape: The sci-fi “escape room” visual novel-style series nobody talks about

I can’t help thinking that Parascientific Escape would probably have an active fandom somewhere on the Internet if it wasn’t TRAPPED ON THE 3DS ESHOP.

I mean, it’s an escape room-centric visual novel-style sci-fi Japanese game that is clearly inspired by Zero Escape and very anime in its style. There are endearing characters, including optimal waifus/husbandos, plus a gradual buildup of an interesting fictional world full of political intrigue, its own countries, its own companies, and of course... psychic powers. Because you can’t have a trilogy of Japanese visual novel-style games featuring escape room puzzles without mental powers, now can you?

But as I said... they’re trapped as download-only titles for the 3DS. That’s fucking brutal. 

Even so, there’s a pretty big 3DS/2DS user base still in existence. It’s not like they’ve never been translated or something, so at least we have the capability to play them. So if you look into them, what are you getting?

A basic overview: Parascientific Escape is a trilogy of anime-style games about solving escape room mysteries and tracking down evildoers via the use of psychic powers (obvious Zero Escape influences). There’s an overarching plot about a mysterious mastermind who believes it’s time for the recently emerged psychics of the world to take their place as the next evolution of humanity and get their own nation (obvious X-Men influences).

They don’t work very well as standalone stories; each story relies on information from the last one, culminating in a game that stars the protagonists of both parts 1 and 2 together as they finally unravel the motivations behind the events of the whole series and face off with the people behind everything. In addition, the escape room puzzles start out pretty easy in the first game build to be pretty frustratingly obtuse by the tail end of the third. And on top of all that, each game taken on its own only contains about 3-4 escape rooms. So when you bundle all three together, that’s when it all works as a single satisfying package. 

Don’t worry about burning a lot of cash to play the whole series, however. The three games are $5.00 US each on the 3DS eShop and are usually on sale for $2.50 each these days. I got the entire trilogy for $7.50 US!

So let’s break down the gameplay and setup in a little more detail. Don’t worry; I won’t give any spoilers that go beyond the first five minutes of any game in the series. The twists and turns are part of the fun here.

The first game is Parascientific Escape: Cruise in the Distant Seas. You play as  Hitomi Akeneno, a high school girl (because of course she’s a high-schooler) with the dual abilities of mild telekinesis and a type of clairvoyance that lets her peer past barriers or into the insides of objects. She finds herself trapped on a sinking cruise ship where some mastermind keeps systematically locking her into isolated sections while she’s trying desperately to escape. 

I really liked how you could look inside of an object with clairvoyance and then use her telekinesis to manipulate the various switches and levers within, gradually pulling some object you need out from within a maze. I also thought it was clever how the solution to a new escape roomight require you to backtrack to a previous escape room to investigate some object or area that wasn’t relevant to that previous room’s original puzzle. 

(One of the things I found most fascinating about this one is the ethical debate raised by Hitomi’s friend Chisono regarding how Hitomi got herself involved in all this. Chisono offers a perspective that is extremely unusual to see in most fiction. You can even say it’s pretty cold, but it’s not without having some merit to it. I don’t want to say too much about what I’m talking about, though; it’s better left as a surprise.)

The second title, Parascientific Escape: Gear Detective, almost seems standalone at first. You play as Kyosuke Ayana, a private detective and actual adult (!) who is 22 years old. A young woman shows up at his office and asks to hire him for protection. See, there’s a serial killer on the loose, and she believes she’s the next target.

We are swiftly told that Kyosuke was once in an accident that necessitated the replacement of his left arm and right eye. He volunteered to be a guinea pig for some very special prosthetics that granted him artificial psychic powers. As such, he now has “chronokinesis” — to the power to look back in time. However, he can only look back for five days, and he only has limited ability to move or manipulate the things he sees in the past. 

Naturally, Kyosuke’s investigation winds up trapping him within some escape rooms that require use of his unique abilities to solve. Some of the hints at the proper timestamps or exactly where you should be looking when you peer into the past are a little vague, though, which can cause momentary frustration. Because I like to always be making forward progress, I actually preferred Hitomi’s telekinesis/clairvoyance powers from the first game. Still, Hitomi had some pretty basic puzzles in her rooms. I can’t deny that these puzzles took more thought.

Outside of the escape rooms,  everything is undeniably a huge improvement. The first game presented strictly linear segments of storytelling between the rooms, but this one is more of an adventure game. You can choose where you go, select from a limited menu of things to do when you get there, and do all of it in any order you like. There’s usually a correct sequence order to progressing the story, but it’s typically pretty clear what the next step is, so it’s not like you’re just flailing about and trying a bunch of locations blindly. Besides, there’s no way to get stuck, so don’t stress it. There are even a lot of actions you can take that have no impact on story progression at all — they’re just there to generate additional dialogue that further develops the characters. 

The tradeoff is that you actually get fewer escape rooms overall. The first game had four, but the second only contains three. This is also the first game in the series to introduce multiple endings; you get a number of dialogue choices throughout, and unfortunately, it’s far too easy to trigger the “bad” ending. There are guides online to help you trigger the Gold Star “true” ending, however. Just hit up GameFAQs. You might want to use the guide on your first playthrough, because I can say from experience that it’s annoying to have to replay all the dialogue sections just to make the correct choices. (Luckily, you can skip over any irrelevant sections of each chapter — including the escape room puzzles.) 

In spite of my above whining, the second one is probably my single favorite story in the Parascientific trilogy. It’s a lot of fun.

The final game in the trilogy is Parascientific Escape: Crossing at the Farthest Horizon. Mysterious characters who were plotting offscreen for the previous two games are finally given faces, locations that were talked about extensively in both are finally visited, and the two protagonists of the first couple games finally meet and team up. It’s absolutely a culmination of what they set up in the first two.

The narrative jumps around from the perspectives of many different characters, but the most time is undoubtedly spent with Hitomi and Kyosuke. Sadly, there is no gameplay usage of Hitomi’s powers this time; the escape rooms are all done with Kyosuke, and they are more devious now than ever before. Personally, I found the next-to-last one to be incredibly obtuse and frustrating. I ultimately had to consult a video playthrough on YouTube for that. (The YouTuber in question didn’t seem to have the same issues figuring things out that I did. So I guess your mileage may vary.)

The “adventure game” segments make a return here as well, although they’ve also become a bit tougher to figure out. There are a couple of times when you might find yourself wandering the various location options, clicking on every possible action to try and progress. Luckily, there aren’t so many default options that you’re left flailing for very long. Even the longest period of clueless wandering lasted me a maximum of 15 minutes.

Once again, you have to make the correct dialogue choices if you want a positive ending. And once again, GameFAQs is your friend and co-pilot.

Ultimately, even the gated endings and occasional puzzle frustrations did little to curb my enthusiasm. I really had fun with these characters and their stories, I greatly enjoyed the majority of the escape rooms, and I was pretty satisfied with how it all wrapped up. The character designs/artwork get better and better as the series goes on. The selection of music tracks may be the same throughout the whole series, but I really dug on them, so I can’t complain. Do I have any other misgivings? Well, just one; the English localization is pretty sloppy. There are a pretty large number of typos, and the dialogue can sound stilted and awkward at times due to being a direct translation. It’s actually at its worst at the start of the first game. Luckily, after about 30 minutes of playtime, it settles in and finds its voice.

Seriously, they should really figure out a way to re-package these games for another system that doesn’t use the the dual-screen setup. Put all three of them together, and it’d easily be satisfying as a full retail release!

But for now, if you have a 3DS/2DS, they’re only $7.50 in total most of the time (and $15.00 at the worst). Do you like adventure game-style mysteries and visual novel-esque progression and, of course, escape rooms? You should give these a shot! And I hope these devs get to make games with bigger budgets and better localizations in the future.

[snifflyjoonie]

A Rose by Any Other Name

In which Min Yoongi finally takes Park Jimin out on a real, proper date.

(a little) snz-centric featuring a slightly allergic Yoongi and an incredibly endeared Jimin. 

Word Count: 3855

FlowerShop!AU Part 4

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3

a/n: I...have no excuses. I’m in a mood. Bear with me again, lol. There will be a break from the boys I swear. That being said though, I still hope you guys find some enjoyment out of this silly little thing! 💕 side note if you happen to read this: for the next chapter are we wanting a yoongi focus or a jimin focus? I’m not going to give away whaaaat will be happening exactly, (you can maybe get a hint via the moodboard on my masterpost page lol) but -- If you have a preference please let me know! 

-

It took two full weeks for Yoongi’s cold to fully make its way through Jimin’s system. To Jimin, it really hadn’t been that bad. Once his fever had broken by day three, the remaining symptoms were simply a mild nuisance more than anything else. 

As he recovered, he made sure to thank Namjoon profusely for stepping in to help with his deliveries. The day off to rest had really been his saving grace, and there just weren’t enough gift baskets in the world that could truly express the proper amount of gratitude Jimin wanted to convey to his long-time friend. 

Just as Namjoon had promised, the deliveries went off without a hitch, and the man had ended up genuinely enjoying the work. So much so in fact, that he offered to keep it up during the day in order to ease Jimin’s workload. Touched that Namjoon even wanted to do so, the florist had happily agreed, and the two men hurried to work out the necessary details one-on-one. Not long after, Namjoon officially became the shop’s first real employee: a much-needed delivery driver who always seemed to have a smile on his face no matter the occasion. They were an unstoppable duo.

And then, there was Yoongi. 

As the two men took the time they needed to recover from each of their respected colds, they rarely missed a day of messaging. Once Yoongi had broken the ice about wanting to take Jimin on a date, there really was no stopping the mutual pining that only seemed to increase the more time they spent apart. To help combat this, Yoongi made sure not to shy away from showing up on Jimin’s doorstep once or twice to drop off things like Nyquil or ibuprofen. It was his own silly nod to the florist’s previous impromptu visit, and Jimin was always grateful whenever he’d choose to swing by, no matter how brief.

However now that it was two weeks later and both men were healthy, Jimin was in the process of getting ready for their first official date. 

He had been on dates before, of course — At twenty-five he had in fact been on a lot of dates — but something about this one had felt different right from the get go. Yoongi was unique. There was just something about him that had drawn Jimin in from the moment the man had set foot into his flower shop nearly a month prior. He held himself with a mysterious air of nonchalance that reminded Jimin of strolling through an art museum or laying down in the street while it rained. He was special, and Jimin had picked up on that right away. The florist was eager to learn more about what kind of a person he was underneath the cryptic layers he guarded himself with. In fact, he almost felt privileged that Yoongi seemed to want to share a new vulnerable side of himself with him, and open up more fully.

They had planned for dinner at some fancy restaurant that Jimin wasn’t familiar with but Yoongi swore up and down by. The man’s excitement of the choice in turn amped up Jimin’s own, and it left the florist feeling like a perfect fifty-fifty mix of anticipation and uneasiness.

Not wanting to overdress, Jimin ended up deciding on an outfit that felt both comfortable yet put together. It hugged his body in all the right places and made him feel confident and secure. His figure was one of his strongest personal assets, and he enjoyed showing it off when he could. Today was definitely not an exception. 

Jimin ended up ready for the date nearly a full hour before Yoongi was supposed to pick him up, and it left him spending most of his time pacing his apartment out of pure nervousness. He really liked Yoongi, and because of that, really didn’t want to mess anything up. He may’ve been a risk taker, but he was also prone to letting his anxieties get the better of him. This was especially true when it came to dates, and even more so when it came to Yoongi. 

In an attempt to distract himself, Jimin spent the rest of his time flipping through channels on his television. He tried to pay attention to a handful of shows, but his mind was elsewhere — too full of what was to come to keep up with any of the bad sitcom plots. 

By the time Yoongi texted him to let him know he was on his way, Jimin had flipped through at least thirty of the channels. The butterflies that swirled in his gut as he read the message caused his stomach to bubble with sour nausea. He let out a stuttering sigh and tried to calm himself down, running shaky hands through his hair before dragging them roughly down his face. He needed to snap himself out of it and he knew it. If he didn’t, he feared he might make himself sick. 

Taking another unsteady breath in through his nose, Jimin allowed his mind to wander to Namjoon and the way his friend had described his ex-coworker. He had said Yoongi was quiet, but had a heart of gold; was funny, but not someone you’d want to piss off. To Namjoon, Yoongi was actually a bit of an enigma, and he didn’t shy away from letting Jimin know this. The sensitive florist had been thankful for the forewarning as he’d had his heart broken one too many times to warrant it happening again. However, instead of being scared off by the prospect, he was left feeling only intrigued —  who really was Min Yoongi if even his co-workers hadn’t truly known him?

Jimin was abruptly pulled back to reality by a knock that echoed through his apartment. He swallowed thickly when he felt his heart leap into his throat and allowed himself one final deep breath to calm his nerves before rushing to the door. It was now or never.

As he pulled it open, there stood Min Yoongi. 

The man was dressed in a form fitting button up that he paired with a stylish black blazer and matching slacks. It was the most put together Jimin had ever seen him, and the sight made his heart race. He took it all in, eyeing the man up and down. He honed in on the little things like the specific way his bangs rested against his eyebrows, and the way his colourful tattoos poked out from beneath his tailored sleeves. He was breathtaking, but even so, what stunned Jimin the most was the single red rose that he held delicately in his left hand.

“Hey, Jimin.” Yoongi finally spoke, smiling softly at the florist.

“Yoongi,” Jimin breathed, a ghost of a smile pulling at his lips. “hey.”

Yoongi’s smile extended wider still, his gums poking out from beneath his lips as his eyes crinkled at the very corners. He extended the rose out to the other, and Jimin accepted it graciously.

“Before you ask, a friend of mine grows them.” He laughed at his own explanation and ran a knuckle against the underside of his nose. “I called in a favour. His are not quite as nice as yours, but I figured it would do.” He winked and Jimin instantly felt his cheeks warm as he averted his eyes, instead choosing to focus his attention on the gorgeous rose. If Yoongi kept up the sweet talking he fully expected to turn just as red as the flower in his hands.

“Anyway,” Yoongi continued as he stole a quick glance over his shoulder towards his still-running car. “Ready to get out of here?”

*

The city’s bustling nightlife sped by in gorgeous streaks of blues and reds as Yoongi drove the two towards their destination. Jimin was near mesmerized by the sights outside of his window as he typically didn’t spend much time on this end of the city, let alone spend said time out during the evening. He wasn’t really much of an extrovert by nature and ended up spending most of his evenings either scurrying around his shop or simply at home with a good book. He had initially pegged Yoongi as being the opposite — someone who used to bartend with Namjoon had to be as outgoing and boisterous as he. However, as he spent more time with the other, the confidence he originally had in this assumption began to falter. Now, he really didn’t know what to make of him. Getting to know Yoongi was like trying to read text in a language he wasn’t fluent in.

The pair spent the beginning of their drive in silence, the quietness of the car only being broken by Yoongi’s occasional sniffling as Jimin’s gaze stayed firmly locked onto the unexpected rose that he held in his hands. The man knew Jimin was aware of his allergy, and yet he had arrived on his doorstep with the beautiful flower anyway. Jimin was grateful, but he did find it a bit peculiar — why put yourself through the nuisance of an allergy for a simple gift? Because he was a florist? Because flowers were something he was passionate about? Maybe that was just the kind of person Yoongi was: someone who valued others’ joy over their own suffering. Jimin really didn’t know what to make of him or the gesture. 

Getting fed up with the silence and his own over-analytical thoughts, Jimin forced himself to pull his attention from the rose and instead to Yoongi, and mustered up as much courage as he could to try and start up a conversation.

“So…” He managed to huff as he crossed his legs, warranting a curious side eye from the other. “Do you take all of your first dates to this place?”

The question made Yoongi snort and he shook his head a bit at Jimin’s bluntness.

“Only the special ones.” He retaliated, stealing another glance at Jimin from behind the wheel as he swiped his thumb against his nose.

“And...how many of those were there?”

There was a pause as Yoongi allowed himself a moment to search for the right answer.

“Well, just you.”

Jimin felt his face flush instantly as he let his gaze fall back down to the rose held softly in his hands. He heard Yoongi chuckle fondly at his lack-of response and felt his blush deepen still. He seemed to know just what to say to make the blood rush to Jimin’s cheeks within seconds. He’d been able to do so since the day he walked into Jimin’s flower shop, and Jimin knew he was in trouble the very moment Yoongi had opened his mouth. It had been a long time since anyone had had this type of affect on him, and the prospect of what that meant made his stomach flip. Unsure of how to respond, Jimin simply continued to let Yoongi chuckle to himself and carefully fiddled with the petals of his flower. 

Just then, Yoongi’s laughter died on his tongue as a sudden wavering breath shuddered its way out of him. Acting fast, the man clamped his free hand down hard around his nose and ducked into himself, clearly trying to turn out of Jimin’s view as he forcefully stifled a sneeze into his palm. 

“huh—NGx’ttschhiuew!— shit, sorry.”

“Oh, bless you.” Jimin offered sympathetically as Yoongi straightened himself back up and sniffled into his hand. “It’s the rose, isn’t it? I should’ve left it at home.”

Yoongi waved off the other’s suggestion and fished a tissue out from the pocket of his blazer, bringing it up to dab at his nose.

“No, no, you’re fine. I expected you to bring it.” He scoffed, visibly annoyed by his own allergy. “It’s really my own fault. I didn’t think only one would get to me like this. Must just be the closed space of the car.”

Jimin hummed in agreeance as Yoongi sniffled sharply against his tissue. He couldn’t help but feel bad even though the other had really dug his own grave by bringing the flower as a gift in the first place.

“I mean,” Jimin started. “if it’ll help I can just get rid of it when we get to the—”

Yoongi’s free hand snapped to his chest and he gripped his shirt as if he’d be shot.

“Jimin.” He cut off the other with an over dramatic grimace plastered on his face. “Get rid of it? You wound me.”

Jimin shook his head, unable to suppress a laugh as it bubbled its way to the surface. He had only ever gotten small glimpses of Yoongi’s sense of humour in the short time they’d known each other, so he had found himself mostly unsure of what to expect. The man had always seemed so serious and stoic whereas Jimin considered himself to be a bit of a goofball. Laughter was important to him, and the fact that Yoongi was coaxing out waves of it only solidified Jimin’s infatuation.

“Hey,” Jimin managed through another laugh. “you know I didn’t mean it like that. It’s just...I remember how you got the last time, that’s all.”

“You mean how we got last time?” Yoongi retorted as he raked his fingers through his hair. There was a playful grin stuck on his face that made Jimin feel slightly self-cautious as he recalled their first encounter. Yoongi wasn’t lying — they were both a mess.

“That’s not fair.” Jimin groaned with a shake of his head. “I can’t help it.”

“Well, technically, neither can I.”

The florist let his rose fall delicately into his lap before folding his arms across his chest and sighing. Yoongi had a point, though their circumstances were vastly different. 

“Anyway, it doesn’t really matter,” Yoongi chuckled as he expertly brought his car around a tight bend. “We’re here.”

Jimin blinked in surprise and turned his attention back out of the passenger window as the pair turned into the restaurant's parking lot. 

Just from the outside alone Jimin could tell the restaurant was on the higher-end, and he couldn’t stop a small noise of surprise from slipping past his lips.

“It’s really good.” Yoongi assured him with a small sniff. Jimin wondered if the man misinterpreted his noise as apprehension. “Think...Asian-fusion. I figured since you liked sushi...” He trailed off, directing a small ticklish cough into his fist.

Jimin hummed and nodded, feeling his stomach flip as Yoongi shimmied his way out of the vehicle. After weeks of build up, the florist could scarcely believe they were finally here together going on a legitimate date. The whole situation almost felt surreal and it made his head swim as he exited the vehicle and stepped out into the cool evening air.

Jimin could smell Yoongi’s sweet cologne as the pair walked side-by-side towards the restaurant. It reminded him of fresh rain in the summertime and sweet, ripe tangerines. The smell contrasted slightly with his more intimidating outward appearance and it made Jimin smile to himself as Yoongi pulled open the heavy doors and gestured for him to go through.

Once inside, Yoongi was quick to take the reins. He led them towards the host stand and let the employee know that ‘Min’s reservation for two’ had arrived. Jimin wasn’t aware Yoongi had even made reservations. He felt himself blush as the host smiled wide, greeting Yoongi with an almost teasing-sounding ‘Mr. Min’ before grabbing two menus and instructing the pair to follow him ‘right this way’.

The table the host led them to was set off to the side in a slightly more secluded, private area. A candle burned brightly in the center of the table, illuminating the place settings and creating a romantic ambiance that made Jimin thickly swallow a lump that had lovingly decided to form in his throat. 

As the host motioned for the pair to sit, Yoongi suddenly snapped at the waist with a vicious sneeze he directed into a tissue that made both Jimin and their host flinch.

“Fuck, ‘m sorry.” The blonde managed, snuffling against his tissue as both men offered taken aback ‘bless yous’.

“Catching a cold, Yoongi?” The host asked. Jimin found it a little odd he chose to call him by his first name, but Yoongi didn’t seem at all phased and instead just shook his head.

“No, it’s…” he sighed, clearly fed up with himself, and simply gestured to Jimin’s rose. 

The same rose that Jimin hadn’t even realized was still clutched in his hand.

“Oh my god,” He exclaimed, taking a slight side step away from Yoongi. “I swear I didn’t even realize I was still holding onto this, I—” He swiveled in the direction of the host and extended the flower out to him with pleading eyes. “I’m so sorry, would you be able to keep this in the back until we’re finished? I don’t want to make him—”

Yoongi sneezed again.

“—don’t want to make him uncomfortable.”

The host happily obliged without hesitation, and Jimin was just able to make out the look of appreciation Yoongi shot him as they both took their seats.

As soon as the pair was settled, the host wasted no time listing off the restaurant’s specials as he held the rose behind his back. Jimin’s mind was buzzing too loudly to register much of what the man said, and when he ended by asking if he could grab any drinks, all Jimin could think to say was “water, please.”

“Are you sure?” Yoongi asked as he shoved his tissue back into his pocket. “Tonight’s on me, Jimin. Get whatever you like.”

Jimin flushed but insisted he was fine. Yoongi just shrugged and ordered himself some sort of cocktail that Jimin had vaguely registered as being both the restaurant's signature as well as on special that evening. 

The host smiled and Jimin thought he saw him waggle his eyebrows at Yoongi before walking off to enter in their drink orders. Yoongi rolled his eyes.

“Do you...know him?” Jimin questioned curiously.

“Who, Jungkook?” Yoongi asked, jutting his thumb in the direction that the host had gone. Jimin recognized the name from the host’s name tag and nodded in confirmation.

“Sort of.” Yoongi affirmed. “I’ve tattooed him a couple of times. Good kid, just goofy.”

Jimin hummed in response. He was aware that Yoongi was a tattoo artist but beyond that the man had never gone into much detail. For one reason or another, Jimin found it intriguing to get to see Yoongi’s clientele out in the wild.

Before long, Jungkook returned with their drinks, causing Jimin’s eyes to widen as he set down not only a glass of water but a second cocktail as well. He opened his mouth to object, but snapped it shut again when Jungkook winked and assured them it was on the house. Yoongi merely rolled his eyes for a second time and mumbled something about how he would make sure to sneak the kid a tip on their way out.

Now alone for a moment as they waited for their server to arrive, Yoongi wasted no time letting Jimin know what he thought was good, what the place was famous for, and what he recommended the other to try. Jimin couldn’t help but feel endeared by his uncharacteristic enthusiasm and insisted Yoongi order him whatever he thought was best. Once their server arrived — a cheerful man whose name tag read ‘Hoseok’ — Yoongi did just that.

“If you don’t like it, just let me know.” Yoongi instructed, swiping his forefinger against his nose. “I have no problem ordering you something else.”

“I’ll like it.” Jimin giggled, feeling his cheeks grow warm from a combination of giddiness and the few sips he had taken of his cocktail. “I’m not picky, so please don’t worry. I’ll try anything once.”

Yoongi raised his eyebrows at the statement and softly chuckled. It wasn’t until he responded that Jimin fully registered what had come out of his own mouth.

“I mean, it’s only our first date but...I guess that’s good to know.”

Jimin choked on another sip of his cocktail and made a grab for his cloth napkin, bringing it up to mouth to try and suppress a series of sputtering coughs. The whole display only seemed to make Yoongi laugh harder and he winked at the other as Hoseok swung by to drop off their appetizers. 

Jimin let out a sigh as he wiped his mouth with his napkin, murmuring an apology to Yoongi to which the blonde simply waved off. As Jimin readjusted, Yoongi was quick to explain which appetizer was which, and Jimin was more than happy to listen to him. There was something about Yoongi’s voice that he found naturally mesmerizing, and Jimin truly believed he could listen to him talk about absolutely anything for hours on end. Yoongi could easily make a story about watching paint dry sound like a New York Times bestseller.

The blonde was in the process of passing over a pair of chopsticks when the florist noticed his eyes start to unfocus mid-sentence. He raised an eyebrow curiously and opened his mouth to ask if everything was alright when Yoongi suddenly cut himself off with a sharp intake of breath.

“hHA’ISSHHhh’iuh!”

He fell into himself with a harsh sneeze he couldn’t contain; leaving delicate wet spots splayed haphazardly across the middle of his white button up shirt. He swore immediately and made a grab for his cloth napkin as a rosy red colour started to creep across his cheeks. 

“Bless you.” Jimin managed, desperately trying to ignore the way his own sinuses had started to prickle. He sniffled sharply and prayed it would be enough to alleviate the oncoming sensation. “You alright?”

“Yeah, just…” Yoongi blew out a breath, clearly embarrassed as he straightened himself back upwards. “Look, I’m really sorry about...all of this.” he gestured to himself with a self deprecating chuckle before continuing. “I’m starting to think the rose wasn’t my smartest idea. I just thought only one might not…” He trailed off with a shake of his head.

“You have no reason to be sorry.” Jimin reassured with a soft smile. “But for next time...I like chocolates, too.”

Yoongi raised an eyebrow at this.

“Next time, huh?” he echoed, his dark eyes glowing intensely. 

Jimin swallowed. Yoongi’s eyes were like the deepest part of the ocean and nearly twice as mysterious. He could hardly read the expression that sat just beyond them, and it made him fidget in his seat. Had he possibly overstepped his bounds? Had he been too cocky? Did Yoongi think he was —

All of Jimin’s intrusive thoughts were abruptly squashed as Yoongi reached across the table and interlocked his index finger gently with Jimin’s own. His hand was warm, aside from the cool metal of his rings, and he ran his thumb tenderly across Jimin’s knuckle with the smallest hint of a smile on his face.  

“I think I’d like that,” he murmured.

“Yeah,” Jimin breathed. “Me too.”

[jaybug-jabbers]

Review: Pokemon Fusion Generation

If you are a fan of pokemon, it’s very likely you’ve visited the Pokemon Fusion Generator. This website became terribly popular because it can automatically ‘fuse’ any two pokemon that you select. The results are not always the most sophisticated fusions, but they are always wildly entertaining and occasionally come up with some truly cool-looking new creatures. There have been many artists inspired by these mash-ups, and people have drawn some truly gorgeous pokemon fusions. There is something almost endlessly entertaining about seeing these surprising variations on familiar faces.

Imagine my intrigue when I stumbled over a fan-made pokemon game titled “Pokemon Fusion Generation.” The screenshots I saw confirmed my suspicions. This was exactly what it said on the tin– a game filled with pokefusions that you could catch, collect, and battle with. I decided I had to download it and try it out.

But does “Pokemon Fusion Generation” live up to the hype? Was it just a gimmick that quickly grew dull, or was it a satisfying game? Read on to find out!

(Note: spoiler warnings for the plot of this game, but I try to be as spoiler-light as possible.)

This game is titled “Pokemon Fusion Generation” because it was intended as a fan-made sequel, a ‘generation’ that could be slotted in between gens 3 and 4. Made with RPG Game Maker and material from Pokemon’s Gen 3 as its base, the story takes place in the region of Kanto. In a lot of ways, the game feels like you are playing Pokemon Firered/Leafgreen, but there is a significant twist to the usual adventure we’ve all known since childhood.

The story begins with the protagonist, who is the current Champion of the Hoenn region. You have travelled to Kanto with the idea of trying out the gym challenge of that region, since you have already conqoured Hoenn’s challenges. Things begin rather typically, besides the fact you’re Hoenn’s Champion– you begin at Oak’s lab, meet with your rival (Brendan), grab a typical Kanto starter, pick up a new Pokedex and prepare for your new trip.

However, things quickly begin to change when we run into Bill just a little further up the path. There is a crowd and everyone is excited about one of Bill’s new inventions. He unveals it before the crowd, and announces the creation of pokemon fusions. The audience’s reaction varies. Some people are awed; some are incredibly excited and want some fusions of their own. However, one elder comments that the pokemon fusion is horrifying and an affront to nature. This causes Bill to hestitate and reconsider what it is that he’s created. He retreats to his house in Cerulean to think.

Once you pass through Viridian Forest and Pewter City and track Bill down again, it seems he’s had a change of heart. He decides it’s wrong to fuse pokemon, and he’s going to stop making and handing them out to people. Before he dismantles his machines, however, he decides to fuse one last pokemon to give to you. He offers to fuse your Kanto starter with an Eevee.

There’s someone sneaky afoot, however. A woman in disguise lures you and Bill out of Bill’s house, and that’s when their evil plan is hatched!

Bill’s entire house, fusion machines and all, is yanked from its foundations and carried off by a school of Zubats. It’s revealed that Team Magma and Team Aqua are behind these shenanigans, for reasons we have yet to learn. With the power of pokemon fusion creation in the hands of a nefarious team, we’re not simply going to be taking the Kanto gym challenge; we’ll be trying to track these hooligans down, too, and get to the bottom of things. As you travel throughout Kanto, you find that pokemon fusions have become quite the new craze, and you’re forced to contend with these strange new creatures.

That is the general set-up for this game. But is this a solid fan game worth playing?

The Fusions

Arguably, the heart and core of this game are the pokemon fusions, so it makes sense to judge those while trying to decide if this is a quality fan game.

The world of Kanto is not filled to the brim with fusions. You will not be encountering a new fusion every time you step into the tall grass or battle a trainer. Instead, these rare little prizes are only in the hands of a select few. The rest of Kanto’s population is quite normal. At first, I found this slightly disappointing, as I was expecting an overload of these freaks. However, I came to find that the rate at which you encountered fusion pokes was a nice balance. You didn’t run into them constantly, but you did see them– especially when encountering gym trainers, gym leaders, and team Aqua/Magma foes. It was always a nice surprise to see what new pokemon would pop up, and leaving the fusions to only special moments made the experience feel more exciting. Fusion pokemon were a fashionable trend, and anyone lucky enough to have one of the rare creatures was envied.

Among those lucky enough to own a fusion pokemon were the gym leaders. Each gym leader had added a new poke-fusion to their usual lineup, and one of the rewards for defeating the gym was that the gym leader would give their prized poke-fusion to you. In this way, you ended up slowly building an entire collection of the poke-fusions.

Now, you could not usally find these creatures in the wild. If you wanted to use a pokemon fusion on your team, generally your only choice was to make use of the prizes from your gym victories. Naturally, this leads to a very limited selection of pokemon to choose from. I can understand why some people would find this disappointing. If you happen to dislike the fusions you’re gifted, there’s not much you can do about it. It also severely injures the replayability of this game.

That said, I still enjoyed collecting my team of fusion pokemon. I won’t claim every single one was a fusion that I would have chosen, if I had a choice in the matter. But having that choice removed, I still found ways to appreciate the pokemon that I had. There is a certain satisfaction in figuring out how to use what you’ve been handed, a sort of Nuzlocke quality. Of course, I could have captured and used regular pokemon on my team, if I so desired, but I had decided from the start to use only fusion-pokes, as it was more interesting to me.

Also, I should mention your choices open up a little later into the game. In Fushia City, there are a handful of pokemon fusions who escape from Fushia’s Zoo, and scatter across the land. You can eventually track down and capture these special pokemon in the wild. Thus, you can eventually choose from a slightly wider selection.

What about the fusions themselves, though? Were they any good?

In terms of the sprites and the aesthetics of the pokemon, not all of them were particularly sophisticated merges. Sometimes it was little more than pasting the head and perhaps the tail of one pokemon onto another, with awkward results. If you are familiar with the Pokemon Fusion website, you’re probably rather acustomed to this sort of thing. That said, not all fusions were that way. In fact, the spriting for this game was very well done. Things usually looked clean and well-proportioned, and while some fusions were a little simplistic or awkward, most of them were thoughtfully created and were more complex mixtures. The choices of fusion were extremely off-the-wall, combinations that you would normally never dream of.

It seemed that the goal of these fusions, for the most part, was to make as wacky and silly a combination as possible. The stranger and wilder, the better. Many of them made me laugh and shake my head and wonder why anyone would choose to make that combination. However, occasionally I would run into a fusion that was a truly awesome-looking combination.

Take Girafiloom, for instance. This was a particularly lovely combination that I would love to own myself. Again, it’s kind of a shame we could not choose from a wider pool of fusion-pokes for our own use. However, it still was nice to see what everyone else had. The game has a very wide variety of fusions to encounter when entering into pokemon battles, and you keep encountering new ones at a very good clip. You’re never going to get bored meeting new ones, and the game kept me very amused and entertained with these creative combinations.

The pokemon’s movepools and typings were also fused, of course. In fact, a large part of the entertainment value of battling fusion pokemon was trying to decipher what sort of combination you were looking at, and thus what sort of moves and typing you could expect. It wasn’t always immediately apparant, especially when there were multiple ways to potentially fuse types. Sometimes, the choices this game made on typing confounded me. Why was my Suntank, a Sunflora/Miltank fusion, pure Grass instead of Grass/Normal? I’m not sure. But at any rate, these mixes made for an interesting battle, especially when the battle was a more dramatic one, such as the Elite Four.

The Plot

Now, if this game was nothing more than what I’ve described so far, it would already be a game worth playing. It has a very solid gimmick: collect and battle with pokemon fusions. If I just spent the whole time wandering Kanto and playing the same exact plot as FireRed/LeafGreen, but with fusion pokemon, it would have been enough to convince me to keep playing. It’s pretty charming.

However. This game has something else going for it besides the fusion pokemon. It has actual plot. Well written plot, at that. The story and all of the dialogue feel perfectly in-place in the Pokemon universe, which is something I deeply appreciate. The plot unfolds gradually with Team Aqua/Magma, with a pacing that also feels very much in-line with the official Pokemon games. It feeds you information a little bit at a time at just the right speed, keeping you interested in the story. As you travel and conquer gyms, you learn more about the fusion fad that’s sweeping Kanto and about the mysterious plans of your foes.

I don’t want to spoil too much of the story, but it includes teaming up with Janine to investigate some stolen zoo pokemon, a charming sidequest in Lavander Town’s catacombs that’s right up my alley, a mystery in Cinnabar Island that involves strange weather, and a very entertaining adventure on-board the Magnet Train. Perhaps my favorite part  is the story of Ellie, a Team Magma member who becomes involved in the adventure in a unique way.

The truth is that Pokemon Fusion Generation’s plot is beautifully and thoughtfully done, and it changes this from a decent fan game to an excellent one. While this game does not feature a new region or new locations to explore or new music, the combination of the always-entertaining pokemon fusions with a top-notch story makes the game well worth playing.

The final conclusion of the plot with Team Aqua/Magma was a fun surprise, and I enjoyed it, even if it did leave a few lingering questions about Aqua/Magma’s motivations in my mind. Anyone who’s played Pokemon Ruby/Sapphire is sure to enjoy the ending.

The Team

Herawoodo (Brick Break/Strength/Megahorn/Rock Slide) - Rock/Bug

The first fusion I received, from Brock. While I was very sad to lose STAB on all the fighting moves that this pokemon could learn, adding a Rock typing to Heracross was a rather welcome addition, neutralizing his weaknesses to some common types. Rumble’s Rock Slide really packed a punch and he did a lot of work on this team.

Chareon (Dragon Claw/Flamethrower/Quick Attack/Earthquake) - Fire/Flying

The creation of this pokemon was unique. I had already been using my Charmander, the starter I received from Oak, for a fair bit of time. It was only when I reached Cerulean City and spoke with Bill that he then offered to fuse my Charmeleon with one of his Eevees. Around mid-game, Charlie was having difficulty pulling his weight on the team, limping by with the weak Ember and not much else. But then sometimes happened– he evolved, something I was not sure was possible until it happened. I was thrilled and gladly welcomed the stats boost. In the late-game, Charlie was an incredibly powerful ally, mowing down fellow fire-types and using Quick Attack to pick off almost-dead pokemon surprisingly often.

Wurmlord (Bug Bite/Waterfall/Ice Beam/Surf) - Water/Bug

This pokemon was gifted to me from Misty (who noted the pokemon fusion kind of creeped her out, anyway). Blobby was definitely the weakest link of my team; there’s no need to beat around the bush about it. With poor defenses and poor speed, the Wurmlord crumpled to just about anything before she could even get a shot off. Perhaps it’s not so surprising, considering its Wurmple half. Even her healthy HP stat was of little to help save her. That said, even poor Blobby had her moments of glory. When fighting Lance, she survived a Wing Attack and got an Ice Beam off on a dragon, so who knows? Perhaps she was vital to our victory after all.

Suntank (Body Slam/Petal Dance/Milk Drink/Giga Drain) - Grass

This … abomination was given to me by Erika, who told me I needed to love and cherish it. While its appearance horrifies me, I have to admit the Suntank was extremely hardy, powerful, and useful. In more than one of my important battles, it was Suntank that let me scrape by into a win. The bulky pokemon had redundant health recovery and thus was hard for my foes to kill, and its magnificent Petal Dance was truly a force to be reckoned with. The Thick Fat was especially nice and made Suntank even bulkier, even when faced with super-effective moves.

Chantabuzz (Ice Beam/Softboiled/Light Screen/Thunderbolt) - Electric

Lt. Surge was able to part with this fusion and gave it to me, although I was a bit skeptical of it at first. An electric Chansey? I gradually adjusted to using Orb, and it filled an important slot on my team in terms of coverage. That said, I think I never quite got the hand of using Orb. I don’t normally use Chansey, so the fact that all of its defenses are in its special was something I continuosly forgot. That’s probably why poor Orb fainted an awful lot, despite its massive HP– I kept tossing it in the way of physical attacks. Despite that issue, Orb did a lot of work on my team.

Skarbok (Steel Wing/Fly/Poison Jab/Toxic) - Poison/Steel

Skarbok is one of the more absurd-looking pokemon fusions. Koga will hand you this creature when you defeat him in Fuchsia City. Its typing is unique, and no current real pokemon possesses it. The Steel/Poison pokemon is resistant or immune to a wide range of attacks, and its healthy defenses keep it quite safe. As such, Corkscrew was very often a vital defensive wall on my team, shrugging off Outrages, avoiding poison, eating up ice beams, and many others. His Achilles’ Heel was Ground, something he was four times weak to, but if I was careful I could avoid throwing him into the range of an Earthquake. In terms of attack, Corkscrew never had a move with really high BP and STAB, so he couldn’t always hit hard enough. However, his Toxic + stalling with Fly was a handy tactic, and he could often outstall the competition.

Conclusion

This game is a hidden gem. While it may lack replayability, it’s so very worth that first playthrough. I deeply enjoyed the entire playthrough, from start to finish. If you’re willing to re-visit the region of Kanto and are looking for a quirky, highly entertaining jaunt into the world of pokemon fusions, definitely give this a try.

[metalandmagi]

Summer 2020 Anime Worth Watching!

Apparently it’s time for the summer anime season, even though it feels like time is meaningless at this point. But somehow, there are still new shows coming out, so if you’re looking for something to watch when you’re stuck at home, here’s a list of the first impressions I got from this season. I don’t really know if it’s going to be worth it, considering how the spring season delayed so much, but here we are. 

As always, not all of these are available on Crunchyroll, but I’ll put a * next to the ones that are.

And if you’re looking for a bit more variety, I have lists for 2019 and the rest of this year’s seasons too...because remember when there was good anime being released instead of just everything being an ecchi or a second season?

2019 master list

My master list for every season of 2020 anime

New Shows!

*The God of High School: An over the top action anime consisting of one big tournament arc! It follows a group of teenagers competing in the epic “god of high school” martial arts tournament to determine the best fighter in the country. Following in the footsteps of Tower of God, this is the newest “crunchyroll original” that is being adapted from a South Korean webcomic. You can tell from the first episode that this will be a spectacle with crazy characters and lots of wild action and humor!

Great Pretender: When a Japanese con man pickpockets the wrong person, he ends up hopping on a plane to Los Angeles and getting wrapped up in a scheme with a sassy Frenchman named Laurent...who basically runs the mafia. There’s humor, there’s plot, there’s great characters, and it’s kinda gay. It’s an exciting original anime from studio Wit, so the animation is bursting with character, and both the music and the general vibe remind me a lot of Baccano or even Lupin III. And since it takes place in America with several foreign characters, there's hilarious English and accent shenanigans abound! The bad news is it’s still in Netflix jail, so if you want to watch it legally you’re kinda stuck for now. 

Japan Sinks 2020: A giant earthquake hits Japan, and a family must cope with the mayhem together. Because what the hell else could possibly go wrong this year? This is a new series (based on a novel) made by Masaaki Yuasa, the guy behind Ride Your Wave and Walk On Girl, if that tells you anything about the style of this anime. I’ve only watched the first two episodes so far, but I heard it goes from being a gripping realistic disaster series to a balls to the wall adventure. To be honest, disaster shows/movies freak me out, and this one is pretty devastating so far, which is a testament to how well it's made. But I appreciate that they include glimmers of hope when they’re needed. The best moments are the quiet ones that focus on the actual people and the narration that juxtaposes the time periods. There’s so much atmosphere, and the music really enhances the experience. And it’s all out on Netflix now, with a dub and a sub!

Deca-Dence: When humanity has been pushed to the edge of extinction by monsters called the Gadoll, the rest of civilization is forced to live in enormous mobile fortresses and send groups out to battle the unknown monsters. So basically like Mortal Engines but the fortresses can turn themselves into giant fists and punch the monsters. We follow a girl named Natsume who wants to be one of the soldiers who fight the Gadoll, but she is constantly rejected because of her prosthetic arm. So she ends up with five years of cleaning duty supervised by a stern but mysterious badass named Kaburagi. I honestly don’t care at all about the plot of the anime, because for me the characters are what drives everything, and these character dynamics are great. I’m not going to say it’s the most original story, but I think it’s fun so far. 

*Rent-a-Girlfriend: A typical harem/romance anime that follows the world’s most annoying protagonist named Kazuya. After Kazuya is dumped by his first girlfriend, he seeks out a rental girlfriend out of self pity….BECAUSE APPARENTLY THAT’S A REAL SERVICE THAT EXISTS IN JAPAN?! Like you can actually rent moms/dads/girlfriends/boyfriends and so on. Anyway, his fake girlfriend is the picture of anime waifu perfection...until Kazuya starts being his typical asshole self and she reveals her true nature of being an absolute sass master who don’t take no shit from no boring ass main character. Shenanigans happen and the two of them end up having to pretend they are in a real relationship. And I’m just calling it now...Kazuya’s grandma is the real best girl of the series. If you want a harem that’s actually funny and doesn’t mind roasting the protagonist, give this one a shot. Although I wish this were just a straight up romance instead of a harem because there is no way in hell that any girl, let alone more than one would want actually to date this guy. 

Next Seasons and Continuations!

*Fruits Basket 2019 (Season 2): Thank goodness Fruits Basket wasn’t delayed or cancelled last season because sometimes I feel like it was the only thing getting me through the spring. I’ve ranted about how good it is enough by now. If it can’t brighten your year, then nothing will. Just watch it if you haven’t already. 

*Re:ZERO-Starting Life in Another World (Season 2): Subaru is still trapped in another world, and he’s still as angsty as ever, but that’s not going to stop him from constantly putting himself through hell when he keeps dying horribly every time he needs to reset the timeline! There are mysterious new villains, nobody knows who Rem is (again) and I think there’s a plot somewhere under all the suffer porn. Seriously though, this show is pretty cool (even if I was two years late to the party). It’s one of the most interesting isekai anime I’ve ever seen, and it feels like it’s acting as a deconstruction of the genre, kinda like how Madoka Magica is for magical girl anime...both shows certainly have enough crying. The story is weird but interesting, the world building is cool, the villains (and sometimes the heroes) are batshit crazy to watch, and I like its moments of humor. 

No Guns Life (season 2): The story of Juzo, the hard boiled detective who plays by his own rules continues in the second season of No Guns Life. In case you missed the first season, this is a mystery/action anime that feels like an old noir film had a cyberpunk baby. There’s underground conspiracies, there’s interesting side characters, and...oh yeah the main character has a gun for a head. That’s right. we came to see a bara detective with a literal gun for a face, but we stayed for the world building and mysterious plots!

*Fire Force (Season 2): I’m going to be honest here, I really didn’t know if I should include this one or not. I have a major love hate relationship with Fire Force, but I figured there may be other people out there who would like it more than I do. So in case you missed the first season, this show follows a group of firefighters who puts out fires caused by spontaneous combustion using a mixture of guns and super powers. It was created by Atsushi Ōkubo, aka the guy who made Soul Eater. So it’s bound to be amazing right?

Not necessarily. Strap in for this one lads. 

I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t disappointed with this show overall. Its main characters just aren’t that interesting most of the time, it can’t decide on what kind of show it wants to be, and so much of it just dragged for a good part of the series. I don’t know if it was a problem of pacing or if the plot was just that uninteresting for a while. The first couple episodes set up a very unique plot, filled with intriguing moral dilemmas. And then it proceeded to abandon everything interesting in favor of badly timed fan-service. It just couldn’t strike the balance that Soul Eater had between its humor and its sincerity. If they wanted to make an ecchi show, they should have just made one instead of inserting the same overplayed scenarios into every episode. I don’t care if a show has fan-service as long as it fits the tone, or if it only has certain episodes dedicated to playing up the humor. But Fire Force has a habit of just inserting it wherever it wants regardless of what’s actually happening in the episode. Also, some of the humor revolves around one of the main female characters who has a really messed up self image because she’s slightly more muscular, and not a tiny delicate flower like some of the other girls. Not going to pretend that doesn’t bug me. 

But that doesn’t mean there is nothing good about it! If there wasn’t, I wouldn’t have finished the first season, and I wouldn’t be including this one. So far, the second season has actually been funny because it made the first episode more like filler, instead of cramming in too much plot all at once. And to the surprise of no one, the animation is absolutely god tier. I wish it was being used for something other than clumsy fan-service, but it’s still really something to see. The world building is super creative and 100% my aesthetic, and there were a couple side characters I really loved later in the series (Benimaru). And I did like the twists and turns the series took later in the season when it actually focused on the conspiracy behind the fire force and the cult. When it follows the mysteries it sets up, it’s more fun to watch. Who would have thought? 

TLDR: There’s good stuff and there’s bad stuff. This show is really something you have to watch for yourself to decide if it’s going to be worth it. I’m going to at least try the second season, because I want to see where this goes, but it’s on thin ice. 

Honorable Mentions

Isekai edition! Both of these came out last season, but I hadn’t mentioned them when I made my spring list. But they’re both getting dubs now so I’m still counting them.

*My Next Life as a Villainess- All Routes Lead to Doom!: A twist on the isekai genre where our main protagonist wakes up as a character in her favorite otome game...only to find that she’s actually the bitchy rival side character who ends up either dead or exiled in every route of the game. So naturally she does everything she can to prevent this by becoming a sweet and caring supporting character...who inadvertently makes every single other character in the game fall in love with her. I ignored this show for the first few episodes because I need another isekai in the world like I need a hole in the head, but after hearing everyone rave about it, I caught up with it in no time. It’s a fun take on the otome game tropes, and it manages to be funny and sweet while not committing to any particular pairing.

*Ascendance of a Bookworm (Season 2): That’s right, it’s another isekai where an adult is reincarnated into the body of a child in a fantasy world. But this time, it’s a nerdy girl whose entire purpose in life revolves around reading books (can relate). However, when our main character Mine is thrust into this fantasy world, she quickly realizes that this particular fantasy setting is a little too...medieval  for her tastes...meaning a family of commoners like hers would have no clue how to read and books are only meant for rich people or the church. So of course Mine has to figure out how to either get her hands on some books or make them herself. This is a super cute show that I waited a long time to finally watch, and since the second season is finally being dubbed I wanted to shout it out. It’s just a wholesome isekai version of Dr. Stone. There’s no real action, but it’s a relaxing watch if nothing else. 

Well, there you have it. Hopefully nothing else gets delayed or cancelled because it’s pretty slim pickings as it is. And before anyone asks, I didn’t include GIBIATE because I thought it was a massive disappointment that somehow made a time travel horror anime plot boring. There’s also My Teen Romantic Comedy Snafu, but it’s been 5 years since I watched the other seasons and don’t remember anything about it. But there’s that too in case anyone is a fan of the series and didn’t know it got another season. 

See you next season…if the world is still here by then?

[zachsgamejournal]

PLAYING: Breath of Fire IV

I'm not sure my son is as invested in this game as he was III. He may have point, but he also may need a break...

So, a dragon flooded the dam then said hello at the coast as a mysterious musician hinted at Ryu's dragon lineage.

Afterwards, the group arrives at a town filled with traps. I can't remember 100% why. I think the intent was to keep "monsters" away so that travelers would feel safe to come by. It's kind of silly how the whole town is filled with traps and every villager is obsessed with the efficacy of their own traps.

We need to leave by a pass that is guarded by a soldier. We need the mayor's permission to pass. The mayor has guarded their front door with a cage a la Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels. So you have to willing drop into a pit-trap to get into the mayor's basement. But he's not there. It's assumed he's in the nearby woods.

In the woods is an interesting minigame. There's a particular monster the Mayor has been trying to trap. When you see it, you have to track its footprints. But there's a time limit and traps everywhere.

Success means finding the mayor who proudly injures a creature with a trap. A giant boss monster appears to take revenge, which our heroes have to kill. We're then allowed to use the pass (like the guard could have stopped us).

Gonna break plot summarizing to acknowledge how this game doesn't seem as concerned about moral ambiguity and duality. It seems far more focused on war, war-minded nations, and how war hurts the populace.

After the pass we get to Synesta. I have no idea what we're doing here or what to look for. It's said that this town had previously been contaminated by the Hex, but it's been cleared...on the surface. Turns out the nuns of the local orphanage need help catching a rather escapee young boy. After a less-than-fun mini game, you catch the boy and go talk to the nuns.

The nuns remember Nina's sister, Elina, having stopped by on a special mission. But they don't know what happened next. The young boy says he knows, but won't tell until you finish a game of hide-n-seek.

No thank you.

But I have no choice.

After finding all but the escapee kid, it's said he may be hiding out in the city's underbelly, which is still infested with monsters from the Hex. Still, some random dude that Ryu could one-hit kill prevents us from going downstairs. But he's thirsty.

I'm not sure how much the player has an effect on this, but there's a lady with water for sale. She doesn't sell it to you. Just says she's selling it. Then she walks over to the basement guard and the guy gets distracted by water. Less than exciting.

Down in the basement, we find the boy. He admits that Elina was confronted by a Local "merchant" and Imperial officials. So we need to speak to this "merchant": Marlock. But Marlock's front door is guarded by a muscle guy--whose ass we kick. Marlock is intrigued by our violence and agrees to see us.

Marlock, with his French accent, says he didn't do anything bad to Elina (sure). He expects you to do a deed to get his help. He wants you to track down a theif and leave Nina behind...to help out around the house.

I got confused about where the thief was, cause we found his empty hide out. Turns out you have to stop at one the questions marks on the way. The thief makes a run for it. Now at his hideout, we use a mini-game to catch him. He reveals that he was in-debt to Marlock and the stuff he stole was first stolen from him. Cray thinks this is BS and we go back empty handed to confront Marlock.

All the while, Marlock is slowly trying to get Nina to put her hands on him, cause he's a fucking creeper.

Marlock is not excited by our "failure" and says the stuff was his, whether or not he obtained it by fair means. He offers another job, go help out on a sandflier wharf. Once again, we leave Nina to be objectified and sexually harassed by Marlock.

At the wharf, we're tasked with a mini-game of using cray to push barrels and vases into the correct places. Afterward, we have to load a sandflier with a mildly entertaining mini-game. You use a crane to load boxes. It's not very user friendly, but ah-well.

Just as we're about to throw our hands up about the BS, Nina apepars, followed by Marlock. I fear what they implied happen. Anyway, Marlock offers us the "best cabin" to get to...the next place. Which is where he took Elina. This "best Cabin" is a crate. Makes sense, but Cray isn't having it.

We arrive at a large tower the transports things via magic across the sea. After wandering around, fighting monsters (my son doesn't enjoy the fighting: BORING), we get to the top. BUT the imperial soldier that Nina and Ryu confronted at the beginning of the game stops us. He's not gonna let us leave.

After a boss battle, we jump through the portal. The imperial solider can't believe that he's seen a dragon.

This was good, cause I kept thinking about how in BoF3, everyone is obsessed with the fact that Ryu is a dragon. While other dragons are important to the plot in BoF4, it seems no one really cares that Ryu is a dragon.

FLASHBACK

Or...Flash over...no sure.

Fou Lu is recovering from his injuries. Bunyan is helping him (good ole Bunyan). Once healed, Bunyan asks, sadly, if another war is coming. He was a soldier and didn't like the war. Fou Lu heads down the mountain but is confronted by clown-nose, leading imperial troopes. (I can't remember clown-nose's name, but he's the guy that attacked Fou Lu at the beginning.)

Fout Lu fights off the boss, then turns into a dragon to flee. Clown-nose sends another boss, and Fou Lu is injured in his escape.

Back to Ryu and Friends, they've made it to the Imperial side and go to the next town. This town has a large gun, a la Junon (FF7). it's what they used to shoot the Hex at towns across the see. It requires water to cool down, so they needed an aqueduct. I wandered about, talking to everyone, trying to figure out what to do. Apparently I just needed to leave, cause the next area appeared on the map.

it's the aqueduct. It's short, but requires some camera shifting to figure out. It's kind of interesting, because the game warps you to special battle rooms instead of having monsters appear on the screen, it allows the designers to make more interesting dungeons that don't necessarily have to accommodate the appearance of monsters. But also, the towns are waaaaaay too claustrophobic, making it hard to move around and find things.

The aqueduct takes us to the place the team dreamed about. They're sure they'll find Elina hear. We're caught by an official and he tells use Elina WAS there, but is there no longer. I'm sure this is a play on words given what I know about Elina's fate.

So that's it for now.

The world map is interesting. You don't roam freely like in BoF3, but it also takes less work to get to new locals. I'm a little torn, but it's fine. It also allows the world map to just be a map, offering more realistic looking landscapes...in a sense.

I'm enjoying the graphics. Clearly the team better understood the PS1 hardware. It's still fairly block, but the textures are great and look amazing even for a 20+ year old game!

[mediaeval-muse]

Video Game Review: Assassin’s Creed Unity (Ubisoft, 2014)

Genres: action-adventure, third person, open world

Premise: Blaming himself for the death of his adoptive father, Frenchman Arno Dorian joins the Assassins during the French Revolution in order to seek redemption. Learning that his adoptive father was a Templar Grandmaster looking to promote peace between the Templars and Assassins, and that his birth father was an Assassin (killed by Shay in Rogue), Arno must investigate the Grandmaster’s death and contend with a changing Templar Order, while also sorting out his romantic feelings for Elise, the Grandmaster’s daughter. In the present, the Assassins contact the unnamed Absergo employee and recruit them to their cause, using Arno’s memories to find the body of a sage, which may contain traces of First Civilization DNA.

Platform Played On: PC (Windows)

Rating: 3/5 stars

***Full review under the cut.***

I am evaluating this game based on four key aspects: story, characters, gameplay, and visuals. I will also be evaluating the Dead Kings DLC. 

Content Warnings: violence, blood, body horror

Story: Assassin’s Creed Unity primarily follows Arno Dorian, an Assassin operating during the French Revolution in 18th century Paris. Following the death of his biological father, Arno is adopted by Templar Grand Master de Laserre, who keeps Arno in the dark about the Templar-Assassin conflict. Thirteen years later, de Laserre is murdered following Arno’s failure to deliver a message in time. Arno joins the Assassins to seek redemption and learns that de Laserre was trying to make peace between the Assassins and Templars, but many did not share his vision. Arno must therefore track down de Laserre’s murderer with the help of his Assassin mentor, Pierre, and Elise, de Laserre’s daughter with whom Arno is in love.

There were several elements to the main story I liked: the idea of star-crossed lovers dropped in the middle of a murder mystery during the French Revolution was intriguing, and I liked that the crux of the conflict was a reigniting of the centuries-old Assassin-Templar conflict. However, none of the “crumbs” of the mystery felt particularly engaging; Arno would track down figures which were introduced then eliminated, and even the bigger characters (Robespierre, Germain, etc) didn’t have enough charisma to carry the plot forward. Given the premise, I would have liked to see more emphasis placed on Arno’s emotional journey, since his guilt and romantic turmoil seemed to be more fruitful areas to explore than the larger mystery. I would have liked to see more flashbacks to his memories with his adopted father (like Edward’s flashbacks in Black Flag) to make the mystery feel more personal, and I would have also liked to see more tension between Arno’s Assassin loyalties and Elise’s Templar leanings. The closest we got, in my opinion, to some satisfying interiority were some ghostly figures whenever Arno visited Versailles (good, but infrequent) and a really nice trippy sequence when Arno first joins the Assassins.

I also think this plot felt different from the previous Assassin’s Creed games because there wasn’t a lot of focus on the First Civilization. Arno encounters a Sage - a figure we were introduced to in Black Flag - but there isn’t a lot of focus on First Civilization artifacts or power. It’s not an unwelcome change, but it was different.

The French Revolution was a wonderful choice for a historical backdrop, though I wish Ubisoft had done more (narratively) to make Arno feel entangled with the world. As the game stands, the French Revolution feels more like a set piece - the background is there, and Arno interacts with some historical figures, but the plot itself doesn’t necessarily need to be set during the French Revolution. I would have liked to see the setting be integrated into the main plot more, perhaps by having the Assassins and Templars be more involved with historical events.

The present-day plot which usually serves as the frame in Assassins Creed games is almost non-existent, which made it feel like a distraction rather than an integral part of the story. Most of the modern stuff was just voice-over, with an anonymous Assassin guiding the faceless and voiceless “Initiate” to comb through Arno’s memories in search of a Sage. Periodically, the voice would alert the Initiate that Abstergo was onto them, and the player would have to take Arno through a series of rifts which featured anachronistic obstacles. Personally, I found these parts more annoying than anything, and they didn’t really come together to form a plot of their own, like in previous installments.

The Dead Kings plot was pretty basic. Arno was tasked with finding a manuscript in exchange for passage out of the city. Along the way, he discovers that Napoleon Bonaparte’s subordinate is trying to find an artifact of the First Civilization, which is hidden in a temple under the church. There wasn’t a lot to set this plot apart - it did the job, and I enjoyed myself, but it wasn’t particularly memorable.

Overall, I think Unity’s plot is mainly hurt by its open world setting. The world is so expansive and full of stuff that it detracts from the main narrative; because players can pick up or put down the mystery of de Laserre’s death, it’s easy to forget about it, making it feel less consequential (or, at least, not very urgent).

Characters: Arno Dorian, the PC character, is a charming protagonist with a lot of likeable qualities. He isn’t really a fan of how the Parisian Assassins are more like a cult than a brotherhood, and he’s witty and sassy while also holding onto admirable ideals. I wish Ubisoft had given him a better plot, though I did like that they didn’t overwhelm him with grief and guilt to the point where he was broody. He mostly had a light outlook on life without downplaying the seriousness of the conflicts around him, which made him a fun character to control.

Elise, Arno’s love interest, had a lot of potential. She was independent and highly competent, and I liked that Ubisoft didn’t make her into someone in need of saving. I wish she and Arno got to work more together and that they had had more scenes where they talked about their pasts, but I guess that would have been too sappy for the target audience. Without spoiling anything, I do have mixed feelings about how her story ended. On the one hand, I think it demonstrated a real character flaw that Elise struggled with throughout the game (I like characters to have actual flaws); on the other hand, she didn’t deserve that.

Other characters were a mixed bag. Pierre, Arno’s mentor, was pretty gruff and grumpy, and I didn’t get the sense that the two were particularly close. I wish more was done to cultivate that relationship, especially given Pierre’s arc. Other Assassins were too uptight to be interesting, and the bad guys weren’t charismatic enough to be intriguing. I did like the Marquis de Sade, but that’s because he’s Extra in fun ways. Leon, a child thief in Dead Kings, was also fun, mainly because he played off Arno well.

Gameplay: Unity differs a bit from its predecessors. While the core doesn’t change - players still need to use a combination of stealth and combat to navigate an open world and achieve goals - Unity introduces skill trees and upgradable weapons/equipment. To improve Arno’s abilities, weapons, and gear, players must collect money, earn “Creed points” (awarded for doing impressive things like ledge assassinations or perfect parries), and gain “sync points” (awarded for completing missions). In addition to collecting money from chests, Arno can upgrade his base at the Cafe Theatre to gain a steady income, though there aren’t any widespread economic mechanics, such as the forts/strongholds in Assassin’s Creed 2 or Black Flag/Rogue.

Unity also infamously introduces “helix credits,” a type of currency that players can acquire by paying real, out-of-game money for. Helix credits unlock abilities and upgrades faster (or else just access exclusive content from the online store). I hate this concept just based on principle, so I spent a lot of time exploring the map and unlocking every chest until I built up enough money to purchase legendary equipment.

Weapons themselves were easy to pick up and use, with familiar things such as the hidden blade, one-handed swords, two-handed weapons, pistols, berserk darts, smoke bombs, poison gas bombs, and the like. New weapons included the phantom blade (a silent projectile), the guillotine gun (a gun/blade hybrid gained in Dead Kings), and the introduction of long-arms (such as halberds). I found most of these weapons easy to use, though I did have to get used to the fact that the hidden blade is not selectable as a primary weapon - Arno uses it automatically when doing a stealth kill, but draws his sword or other weapon whenever the player engages in combat.

In terms of movement and stealth, I liked that Arno’s animations were more inspired by real parkour, but I did find it harder to move precisely in this game for whatever reason. I often got stuck on a ledge or wasn’t able to change direction very fast, all of which caused me to fail missions or get killed fairly quickly. I also didn’t like that Ubisoft removed the ability to whistle and draw enemies to a hiding spot; while there were haystacks and structures to hide behind or in, enemies wouldn’t walk by them very often, making them difficult to use for ambushes or stealth kills.

Side quests/activities included a range of things, from “Paris Stories” (quirky missions where Arno had to go kill someone or steal something), to Murder Mysteries (in which Arno had to search for clues and arrest the correct culprit to achieve unique weapons and armor), to “Nostradamus Enigmas” (riddles which led to different landmarks and rewarded Arno with keys to the legendary armor beneath his base). I personally found these fun, even if a lot of them weren’t memorable. They did their job and provided some entertaining little narratives, so I can’t complain too much.

Unity also introduces a lot of coop multiplayer missions, which can be completed with other players or on your own. Players can form or join “social clubs,” which are mainly just teams of gamers, or search the internet and complete missions with strangers. While I liked that the coop missions were able to be completed alone (they were harder, but not impossible) and I was able to play some missions with a friend, I did not like that most of them required players to replay them 3 times in order to get all collectibles and rewards. For a completist, the coop missions will be repetitive, and at times frustrating if there’s a locked door you can’t access without upgrading your skills.

In terms of collectibles, Unity primarily has money chests, cockades (which unlock color schemes for Arno’s outfits), newspapers, artifacts, and nomad points (which can be used in the companion app). Other than the money, I didn’t find the collectibles very rewarding - I didn’t have the companion app, and I didn’t much care for new color schemes or armor/equipment.

Dead Kings introduces tricorns as collectibles while also inserting a few “Franciade Stories,” Murder Mysteries, and “Suger Enigmas,” all of which resemble their counterparts in the base game. The enigmas in Dead Kings were a bit harder than those in the base game because the answers weren’t necessarily in or around landmarks; players have to really pay attention to the map instead of relying on the database for historical clues. I also found it annoying that players could get accidentally stuck in Dead Kings; if you start the DLC unintentionally, you can’t return to the base game until after you complete the first mission. It really sucks if you’re underpowered or just want to experience the narratives in order.

Visuals: Unity is a visually stunning game, with a lot of beautifully-rendered environments, character designs, and the like. The streets of Paris feel like they are inundated with chaos, with crowds of shouting people moving past walls papered with posters and defaced by graffiti, while the interiors are detailed according to the social class of the inhabitants. Arno can wander into a poor person’s home, empty save for the basics, or a rich person’s, decorated with gold and elegant paneling. I very much enjoyed exploring the world and seeing landmarks such as Notre Dame overlooking a rich, vibrant world.

I also really liked Arno’s outfits, all of which captured an 18th century aesthetic. Arno can wear a number of coats, hoods, pants, belts, and bracers, all of which feature a blue, white, and red color scheme by default. I liked that the color scheme wasn’t based around white, as in previous games, as it made Arno feel more part of his world.

In terms of animation, Unity is really buggy, even years after release. Characters would float in the air or get stuck in odd places, but even so, I didn’t find it difficult to complete the game. I did really like that Arno’s combat animations were inspired by fencing, and his kills were fluid and elegant, almost like a dance.

Final Verdict: Although Assassin’s Creed Unity attempts to bring a new kind of gameplay to the franchise and includes some charming protagonists, the difficult controls, lack of engaging plot, and introduction of microtransactions make it merely an average installment in the series.

[woolishlygrim]

Winter Weebwatch #5

After last week’s surprisingly bad bunch of episodes, this week’s episodes are surprisingly good! There was also no Darwin’s Game this week, probably because it got pre-empted by a sporting event, but to be honest, I don’t think anybody was especially crying out for another three paragraphs of me struggling to remember what happened in it.

Also, there is a huge trigger warning for discussions of suicide, both in fiction and in real life on this post, specifically in the ID: Invaded review.

In/Spectre

★★★★☆

So, this episode was cruising along for an easy three stars for most of its runtime. Continuing on the Steel Girder Nanase storyline, the episode sees Kotoko and Saki simultaneously deciding to hate each other and deciding that they need to work together to decipher the truth behind Steel Girder Nanase, who they believe to be the ghost of an idol, Haruka Nanase, who was accused of murder and subsequently was found crushed by a steel girder, her face unrecognisable and even her teeth unidentifiable, the body only identified by virtue of carrying Nanase’s identification.

… Just so we’re all absolutely on the same page here, next episode is definitely going to reveal that Nanase murdered someone else to fake her own death, and that Steel Girder Nanase is actually some poor woman who was her victim, right? Right.

But anyway, this episode settles into a nice, consistent tone, sets up a fun and legitimately intriguing supernatural mystery, and seems all set to make its way to a satisfactory conclusion in one or two episodes, probably.

What elevates it to four stars, though? The fairly throwaway joke in which a fully animated opening sequence for a completely fictional magical girl show, complete with an original and fully vocalised song, plays, and ruthlessly satirises the far-right, taking shots at capitalism, militarism, and the police and justice system.

It’s a joke that doesn’t fit the tone of the rest of the series at all, but it’s so unapologetically vicious while also making me laugh out loud that I had to add an extra star for it. I just had to.

ID: Invaded.

★★★★★

Honestly, I wavered on whether this should be a four star or a five star. If I could do half stars, it’d be four and a half, but I think it edges out five.

This episode switches gears a little. With the Gravedigger killed, and the woman who was manipulating him into his murders arrested, Sakaido dives into the woman’s mental world, hoping to figure out exactly what caused her to turn to murder, and why murder in such a specific, gruesome, and sadistic way.

And he fails completely.

The story tempts us with just enough information that we can start forming the half-baked foundations of a hypothesis, but not enough that we can actually form any kind of cohesive theory. We see in the woman’s mental world that she is stuck as a child, endlessly riding a train that’s going in circles, each loop having it cross the train crossing where her mother committed suicide. We see that her victims are gathered at said crossing, waiting patiently to cross. And we see that her accomplice, the man she had killing for her, is present on the train as well, as a young boy very far removed from the blank, not-all-there man we’ve seen up to that point. We see Kaeru, usually representing the murder victims, in this mental world is presented as a suicide victim, having removed her shoes and asked the woman to wipe off her wounds before expiring in a seat at the end of the train.

But we never get enough to build any kind of meaning out of it. The show deliberately withholds closure from us, mirroring the woman’s lack of closure over her mother’s suicide (why did she decide to do it, and why do it by throwing herself in front of a train she knew her daughter was riding?), telling us that we will only ever have a handful of puzzle pieces and no way to piece them together.

I admit, that affected me pretty deeply. As someone who obsesses over puzzles and especially over the whys and wherefores of why people do things, whose lowered empathy response means that figuring people out is often a maddening struggle, the show presenting a puzzle that can’t be solved is infuriating. But more than that, as someone who has had a friend commit suicide, leaving no note and providing almost no indication beforehand that he was going to, I’m familiar with the bewilderment that can follow something like that, the attempts to piece together a cause-and-effect that makes sense.

This episode kind of got to me. I’m not sure I liked that it did.

‘Not having enough information’ is the running theme of this episode, anyhow, as the rest of the investigation team takes some time to discuss the recurring appearance of John Walker, a mysterious man in a red frockcoat who has appeared in five separate killers’ mental worlds (and who appears also in the woman’s, as a reflection in the train window). As they talk, they realise all they know is a baffling mess of contradictions about him: Nobody has ever seen him in real life, and yet the fact that five different people dreamed him up wearing the same bright red coat means he must be going around wearing what is basically American War of Independence cosplay; there seems to be no single link between the killers who have him in their mental worlds, and yet there are strange coincidental links; none of the killers remember who he is, but all of them have extremely strong recollections of him.

The end of the episode pulls another gutpunch on us, as Hondomachi, having killed the Gravedigger in seeming self defence earlier in the episode, finally gets her wish to be trained to dive into people’s mental worlds -- only for Hayaseura, her boss and the man who recommended her, to tell her that it’s not enough to have just killed, you have to be a serial killer, something he knows that she is. While we obviously saw her murder someone (by provoking them into attacking her and then framing it as self-defense) earlier in this episode, Hayaseura also points out something that I’d dismissed at the time and completely forgotten about: That in the very first episode, before Hondomachi was kidnapped by the Perforator, she was alone with one of his victims in the basement, and when we next saw him he was dead, even though the Perforator couldn’t have killed him.

That’s … actually some really solid writing. I hadn’t even realised on my first watch that the guy couldn’t have been killed by the Perforator.

Pet.

★★★★☆

I feel like I haven’t given this series enough credit for how surprisingly vicious it is. The first episode sets us up to think that Tsukasa and Hiroki’s friendship is pretty cute, and the second episode clues us in to the fact that they’re (quasi-?)romantically involved and sets up a clearly unhealthy but quite sweet all the same romance where you think that, hey, they’re screwed up people but they clearly love each other. It isn’t until the third episode that the rug gets pulled out from under you, with the reveal that Tsukasa is actually quite abusive, and this episode pulls the rug straight out from under us again.

It follows two plot threads. The first one is a milder one, with Satoru meeting the niece of the mysterious Company’s CEO, who exposits at him a little about how the Company was founded and some of the strifes that have led it to its current state of disarray -- namely that the qigong masters who created the psychic techniques the Company uses (just … roll with it) all simultaneously betrayed the CEO and were killed for it, leaving the Company with only one person who can pass on those teachings: Hayashi.

The second plot thread sees Tsukasa and Hayashi playing mind games with each other, with Tsukasa first trying to persuade Hayashi to return to the Company, before Hayashi tries to psychically rewrite Tsukasa’s memories, only for Tsukasa to rebuff him and for the two to end up in a psychic battle where they both try to repel the other one’s attempts to alter their memories.

It’s in this second plot thread that we learn all about Tsukasa’s many issues: Like Satoru, he is most definitely in love with Hayashi, and like Satoru, those feelings clearly aren’t reciprocated. Unlike Satoru, however, Hayashi doesn’t even seem to have filial feelings for Tsukasa, and we learn that when he started teaching Satoru, the Company told him that he couldn’t act as mentor for two people and had to choose one. He picked Satoru with what seems like startling ease, effectively abandoning Tsukasa.

There are allusions, as well, to the idea that Hayashi kept using Tsukasa even after that abandonment, entreating him to infiltrate the Company on his behalf and keep Satoru safe. Tsukasa’s … not happy about this at all, and also, as becomes swiftly apparent throughout the episode, more than a little unhinged.

As the episode ends, Tsukasa and Hayashi are ramping up their psychic battle, with Tsukasa informing Hayashi that he’s learned some tricks off Hiroki, so we’ll see where that one goes.

Infinite Dendrogram.

★★☆☆☆

More and more, it feels like this show is falling into a rut, and that’s honestly a huge shame.

There’s just no forward momentum to it. Things happen, but there’s no sense of motion, no sense of things winding towards a conclusion, either on an arc level or a series level, and yet at the same time it’s not fast and snappy enough to be a truly episodic series like, say, Kekkai Sensen.

So, this week’s episode sees Ray, now cursed with dog ears (for reasons which are not plot relevant, but I mean, it’s fine), teaming up with a new character, Hugo, a Dryfe Master whose job is essentially that he’s a giant mecha pilot, as the two attempt to tackle a base of bandits who have been kidnapping children.

The show tries very hard to set the bandits up as absolute monsters, and to sell us on Ray’s rage, but it kind of lacks the elements necessary to make an impact. The huge emotional moment where Ray sees that some of the children have been turned into undead is weakened by the fact that the cinematography is bog-standard, the animation direction for the scene is uninteresting, and the music is unremarkable. Even Ray’s reaction is strangely muted, with some anger but no real horror or anything like that, and not even a quiet fury so much as just moderate amounts of rage.

There are hints of a broader plot involving Dryfe, though (which we know from an earlier episode is prepping to invade), with Hugo making remarks that he can’t use his Embryo yet, because keeping it secret is part of some plan.

He does, eventually, use it anyway, and relatively without fanfare at that.

[teaandgames]

The Teacup Awards! (2019)

So, as holes begin to form in the parachute of time and we fall with gathering speed towards the hard ground of inevitability, we must bid good day to 2019. Another year of political upheaval as the Brexit circus marches on, the American president continues to document every thought in the form of a tweet and the English public prove themselves to be the best foot marksmen around. It was also a year of upheaval in my own life, with a new job and a new home to grapple with. Still, it was an interesting year for games. In part because of how few 2019 releases caught my eye. Because of that I looked back over the last few years, helped by the Humble Monthly bundle, and found a few gems that I missed. So, as usual, these awards will go to games I wrote about this year, rather than just released this year. Otherwise they’d be a little bare. Oh and I’m afraid we’ve lost the horror game award, due to lack of games. I’ll bring it back next year.

The ‘Tea Stained Page’ Award For Best Writing

Runner Up - Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice

There’s a strange thing in visual media where less writing can actually be better. Overwriting something can lead to it becoming weaker, as all mystery and personal connection are systematically destroyed. Hellblade understands that better than most. Most of its writing is given to the voices inside Senua’s head and offer up different interpretations of what’s going on. Some of them are hostile, while others offer encouragement. It’s a fairly unique way of setting up the protagonist. Tied in with the intriguing nordic setting, it makes it one hell of a well written game. Shame about the gameplay, but you can’t have everything.

Winner - The Outer Worlds

I had high hopes for The Outer Worlds. Made by the minds behind the original Fallout games, and my long term flame Fallout: New Vegas, I was hoping for some great character writing with original quests. I pretty much got what I wanted. While some of the quests weren’t exactly as original as hoped, the characters were all charming, deep people. There wasn’t anyone in my party that I excluded because I thought they were boring. Instead, I exhausted everyone’s dialogue trees.

I don’t think I’ve ever done that before, come to think on it. There’s always someone who gets kicked to the curb. If that’s not a testament to good writing, I don’t know what is. Like Hellblade, it suffers from gameplay issues but those almost fade into the background. Instead, it’s just a fun romp through space with a varied, interesting crew of nutjobs. Along with characters, it’s also got various flavours of well-written capitalism. Truly, all things to all men.

The ‘Head Nod’ Award For Best Soundtrack

Runner Up - Ori and The Blind Forest

Apparently, only fifty percent of people get goosebumps when listening to music. That’s a shame, because ‘Completing the Circle’ from Ori and the Blind Forest caused an explosion of goosebumps up my arm. It’s absolutely beautiful. Unfortunately, I made a bad call of listening to it at work which brutally killed my productivity until it was over. There are other gems in the soundtrack too, with a mix of beautiful serenity and fast paced action. Damn, everything in this game is beautiful.

Winner - Katana Zero

When the protagonist of Katana Zero starts a level, he pulls out a pair of headphones and presses play on his walkman. Then the music starts. It creates this odd sense that we’re listening to the music through the protagonist, complete with all the time reversal and everything. It’s also a rare case of the soundtrack becoming part of the story. Our ‘hero’ is so desensitised to what he’s doing that he’s playing music while brutally killing people. But that’s by the by.

What we’re here for is some catchy synthwave tunes to kill along with. ‘Third District’ is a standout, being strangely relaxing for a game where death is only a failed slice away. But that’s kind of the point. Zero is chilling out. He already knows how this is gonna go. Then you’ve got the more faster paced songs, like the requisite disco song, ‘Hit the Floor’. The best comparison I can make is to DEADBOLT. Equally laid back soundtracks that somehow link together with horrific, bloody murder.

The ‘Perfect Cuppa’ For Best Looking Game

Runner Up - Spyro Reignited

Spyro Reginited Trilogy was a bit of a shock, to be honest. I’ve never been too invested in remakes, as they seem to be creative vacuums by nature. Spyro slipped me by when it was big, however, so I thought I’d give it a look. I’m glad I did, as I was greeted by a slick and smooth platformer. What did strike me was how bright and colourful it was. It just looks like a nice place to me. A variety of bright colours, helped by our bright purple dragon.

Winner - Ori and the Blind Forest

Before I played it, Ori and the Blind Forest struck me as an ‘art game’. The type of game that looks really nice as a cover up for its weak gameplay. That wasn’t quite the case, as Ori’s platforming is pretty good (though let down a bit by the combat). That’s not why we’re here though. We’re here because it looks absolutely bloody beautiful. The ‘blind forest’ relates to a part in the story where the forest withers, with Ori being one beacon of light in this dark place. This interplay of light is one reason why it looks so beautiful.

The forest starts off dark with twinkling areas of light throughout. As you progress through the game, life begins to return to the forest and you go off to new locations that all look different. There’s a cave full of lava, for example, or there’s the dark and mysterious Misty Woods. Either way, wherever you go, you’ll find somewhere that looks good. Can’t wait for Ori and the Will of the Wisps.

The ‘Spilled My Tea, Punk’ Award For Best Action Game

Runner Up - One Finger Death Punch 2

Sometimes simple is better. To make a fun game, sometimes you only need one button. Though, to be honest, I used two fingers, thus invalidating the point of the game. For shame. Still, One Finger Death Punch 2 has found new ways to make twatting stickmen challenging. It calls back to those old flash animations, with the exaggerated moves to send the variously coloured enemies flying. It may not look like much when you’re looking at the screenshots of it but I promise you: it’s a damn exciting game.

Winner - Yakuza 0

Another surprise this one. I got it through the Humble Monthly bundle and installed it while not really expecting much. I’d heard a few things about it, mainly how crazy and over the top parts of it were, but I wasn’t expecting to be quite so blown away. There is some madcap zaniness, of course, but layered on top of that is a serious crime story about a low level Yakuza drawn into something far bigger than him. Enter Kazama Kiryu, smart, stoic and with one hell of a heavy fist or two.

That leads us to the action part of the game. It’s split into three styles, Steady, Speedy and Heavy. Or Brawl, Rush and Crash if you want the proper names. The most exciting parts of these being the Heat Actions. Special moves that play out when proper conditions are met. Grappling someone near a wall, for example, will cause Kiryu (or Majima if you’re on his storyline) to throw them against the wall and then break a couple of ribs with his fists. These heat actions make me feel like im in a proper action film and for that, and many other reasons, Yakuza 0 is a clear winner.

The ‘Perfectly Brewed’ Award For Best Revisited

Runner Up - Rayman 2

I finally got around to beating Rayman 2 this year, something I’ve not achieved since I was a kid. While the final boss was atrocious, it is still a great game to me. There is so much imagination filtered down into it. Nothing is predictable, especially not the giant eyeball monster in a hat chasing you down a hallway. It’s like being eaten by Mike Wazowski’s big brother. Couple that with some fairly decent 3D platforming (as decent as it could be in those games) and you’ve got yourself one hell of a Rayman game. I am glad it went back to 2D though.

Winner - Danganronpa

I’ve played games like Danganronpa before, most notably Ace Attorney. However, in that series the worst that could happen is a client being found guilty. It’s awful but it’s not quite on the same level as Danganronpa. Screw up there and all of your friends will die horrible deaths. That kind of contributes to the whole ‘despair’ thing that hangs over the entire game like a dark shroud. It’s very oppressive; it almost qualifies for a horror game if it wasn’t for all the upbeat anime cheeriness.

It’s an odd blend that. Half the game is figuring out whodunnit, while the other half is hanging out with your friends and giving them gifts. That’s what it makes it so effective. It’s rather a cruel joke, really. Danganronpa makes you care about your friends and then kills them without mercy. While it suffers from the usual problem of you desperately trying to catch on to the developers thread of logic when it comes to the murders, the core gameplay and the writing are both top notch. As is the second one, which you’ll be hearing about on Tuesday!

The ‘Accidental Sugar Lump’ For Biggest Disappointment

Runner Up - Sundered

Sundered had a lot of promise. It’s a Lovecraftian Metroidvania game and both of those things are very exciting. Unfortunately, it doesn’t quite deliver on the second one as well as it does the first. The Lovecraftian stuff is there for sure, and lends itself to some good plot notes and strange bosses. Unfortunately, the combat is a total damp squib. It gives no real feedback and there’s rarely a better solution to a problem than spamming the attack button. As a result, playing the game quickly slips down into being a chore. A damn shame.

Winner - Layers of Fear 2

Unfortunately, I feel like this award could probably be named after Bloober Team. They always seem to hit on the right ideas but fail to properly implement them. Layers of Fear had a nice story about a troubled artist that ended with it throwing doll heads at us. Observer led with a great story about hacking into people’s minds but threw in awkward stealth sections and the usual screen wobbliness. Then we get to Layers of Fear 2. A promising story about a method actor blurring the lines between fiction and reality.

Unfortunately, it gets rather too full of itself, making its story take a lot of confusing twists and turns, which makes it hard to figure out who’s who and what they’re doing. Symbolism is haphazardly thrown in so often that it becomes frustrating to try and decipher exactly what it’s saying. That’s when it’s not throwing mannequins at you, for no readily available reason. They literally fall down from above you. All of this leads it to be one unfortunately disappointing title.

The ‘Rate Your Server’ Award For Best And Worst Developer

Best - Hopoo Games

I do love a developer who actually listens to their fans. Hopoo have proved that they really have their ear to the ground with Risk of Rain 2. The Early Access title has gotten a number of updates since it first launched on the service. It’s constantly bringing out new characters and levels, as well as variations on existing ones. More than that though, are the quality of life updates. Risk of Rain 2 has a very vocal community and their changes and suggestions are clearly being looked at.

While it might not seem like too much to ask from a developer, not everyone does it and implements it in the same way that Hopoo does. For consistent updates and an actual sense of community, Hopoo definitely deserves this award.

Worst - Bethesda Softworks

Well, this is a two-year streak, Bethesda. I can’t wait to see how you’ll screw things up next year. For those with their heads in the sand, this award goes to Bethesda for the constant mishandling of Fallout 76, already a silly idea to begin with. I thought the whole thing about the canvas bags, leaked customer data and a weird battle royale mode was bad enough but then they brought in Fallout First.

A paid subscription for a game you’ve already paid for is bad enough. It’s rampant money grubbing and they’re not even bothering to hide it anymore. This subscription service, which is about £100 for a year by the way, gives you a few bits and bobs like a travelling tent and a box for your junk, as well as private servers. Certainly nothing to justify paying more money for a game you’ve already bought. For shame.

The ‘Golden Teapot’ Award For Best Game

Runner Up - Yakuza 0

Well, I said most of what I wanted to in the Best Action Award but here I’ll talk about Goro Majima. A suave ponytailed man, who’s desperate to get back into the Yakuza but instead goes on the run with a blind woman in tow. Throughout the game he carves out his own breed of Yakuza, using his own heat actions and skills. For example, one of his combat styles is breakdancing. Seems a bit less useful than the one that’s just about smashing people over the head with a baseball bat. You take these skills all around the streets of Kamurocho and Sotenbori, getting embroiled in a deep and violent story.

If you like crime games, with excellent combat systems, and don’t take things too seriously then you absolutely need to look into the Yakuza series. And Yakuza 0, to my mind, is the current King of the series.

Winner - Dead Cells

There have been very few games in my life where I’ve started them and immediately felt in awe. Sometimes you just know a game is exactly what you want and made perfectly. This year, Dead Cells was that game. A roguelike game with Metroidvania aspects set in a world that’s been torn apart by a sickness called ‘The Malaise’. Our hero wakes up in a prison- oh I should say our hero is a big ball of sentient goo stuffed into a dead body. Probably important, that. He then has to fight his way through the prison to find the king.

And boy is the fighting good. The combat is extremely tight, with little forgiveness for panicking. A single blow can carve off most of your health, particularly when you add in the ‘Boss Cells’, which function as an extended new game plus system. Add to that some fairly tight platforming, which doesn’t take the center stage, and you’ve got a game that’s as fun as it is frustrating. It has that beautiful quality where every death, and there will be many of those, feels like it’s your fault. That’s absolutely crucial for a roguelike.

It also doesn’t make or break on its items, with each weapon type following generally the same pattern. It’s a game entirely bent on player skill (or lack thereof). I honestly can’t sing Dead Cells praises enough. Everything, right down to the sombre score is brilliant. Absolutely deserving of the Golden Teapot.

The ‘Golden Accompanying Teaset’ Award For Best Game of the Decade

The Binding of Isaac

I had a good long think about this one. A decade is a long time, after all. Ten whole years. A whole lot of games released. With that in mind, I wanted to pick one that was not only a good game in its own right but one that mattered a lot to me personally. With that in mind, I landed on The Binding of Isaac. I think we can all agree it’s a good game, for one. Brutally hard and relentlessly imaginative and it has grown substantially since it was first released, with expansion packs and a remake in the form of Rebirth.

Personally though, it sparked off a love for a genre that’s remained strong to this day. The roguelike genre has been around for many years, of course, since, well, Rogue. But it seems to have picked up a lot more oomph this decade and I wonder how much influence The Binding of Isaac had over that. Certainly, it was pretty damn high profile, initially off the back of Super Meat Boy and then in its own right. It proved that a simple, repeating formula that had thousands of different combinations could be incredibly addictive.

It certainly got its hooks into me. I remember my first year of university, where steam was blocked by my hall’s internet meaning I didn’t have much else on my laptop to play. So I did run after run of The Binding of Isaac, until I could beat the bosses without much trouble. And even then I kept plugging away, trying to unlock everything. I did get the ‘Golden God’ achievement, until multiple expansions made that irrelevant. Ah well.

For the sheer fun and the influences on the roguelike genre, and for making me love the same, it absolutely is my best game of the decade.

Well that’s 2019 done. Personally, I’m hoping that 2020 will be a bit less chaotic in the personal life department. A bit less juggling of money and filling out endless forms and more lying on the sofa playing the games I love. Either way, I hope everyone had a good Christmas, or a good break, and a happy New Year. I hope you’ll join me in looking forward to what 2020 is going to bring. Brace yourselves, eh?

[visitingthefuneralhome]

BtVS Rewatch: 1x10, Nightmares

continuing my weekly rewatch of buffy with my partner (his first time watching), we watched nightmares last week, immediately after The Puppet Show - while we initially planned to watch the show weekly, he enjoyed The Puppet Show so much that we watched three episodes in a row - TPS, Nightmares, and Out of Mind, Out of Sight (OOMOOS). While I have always thought of this episode as one of the best season one episodes, I ended it feeling a little bored and my partner felt more than a little confused about the mechanics. This episode seems to me to have an issue with growing pains: on one hand, it’s trying to be a Monster of the Week horror movie riff like the previous season one episodes - on the other hand, it’s attempting to be a character study with its focus on its principal characters’ nightmares, transitioning the show towards a more character-based mode of storytelling. The results are muddled and half-baked, but you can see the show attempting to be more, and do more with its characters. Even the theme of the episode - childhood nightmares and intergenerational encounters - seems to be inching towards a character focus, compelling the show to consider its characters more forcefully.

more thoughts on childhood, the role of the Slayer, and the show’s movement towards greatness:

What I did remember of this episode before going in is its middle section, where Buffy encounters her dad and you see her fall apart as he tells her she was the reason her parents broke up. On one hand, this is linked to her Slayerhood and her feelings of isolation and shame over it - this moment is an excellent character study in light of that, and an important gear shift for the character as we begin transitioning into season two. And yet, it’s absolutely mired in the plot of our nightmares coming to life, and so it becomes an archetypal scene for a child learning that their parents split because of them. When Buffy the character is played too much as Buffy-as-metaphor, she loses coherence and depth, and we risk losing that here too, as Buffy Summers fades into Buffy-the-kid.

And this episode is all about childhood! We have two children that centre the episode - Billy the kid who’s been beaten up by his coach, and The Anointed One, who The Master pontificated to at the start of the episode. They counterpoint each other, with the Anointed One’s tutelage from the Master mirroring Billy’s tutelage from Buffy later. Where Buffy approaches Billy as an equal, guiding him and respecting his agency, The Anointed One exists to be taught by the Master about the world of nightmares. Fittingly, the Anointed disappears by the time the Master emerges to kill Buffy.

The issue is, with the focus on childhood, the fears and nightmares that emerge are very much of childhood - Cordelia is dragged away to the chess club, Willow has to sing on stage, Xander goes to class in his underwear. These superficial nightmares of this episode ricochet off the MoTW’s focus on childhood, but end up being a middling character study. We already know Willow’s scared of the stage. We will learn next episode that Cordelia has much deeper fears of isolation and loneliness. Xander’s fear of being naked in class tells us nothing.

What it does do, though, is position Buffy as the one teen emerging into adulthood - her fears rapidly escalate and warp reality around them far more than the others’ do. Buffy’s exceptionalism is highlighted her, and her specific fears of being buried alive and being told that she caused her parents’ divorce position her as a liminal figure, trapped, but also moving, between the world of the adults and the world of the children. When the Master emerges to explain the world of nightmares to her, her previous role of teacher to Billy is contextualized, and her adolescence - caught between two worlds - is highlighted, where the Master is very much placed in the role of the old, the aged, the mature. 

The nightmares of this episode do tell us something about the show, where it’s heading, and why Buffy Summers functions so well as a study of adolescence. The Slayer role gives her the responsibility and depth that sets her apart from other students, and highlight the isolation teens (and generally people) face, the sense that your own concerns and issues are the most pressing, apocalyptic, and world-changing. In this light, the superficiality of other characters’ nightmares are a given. At the same time though, it is a disservice to these wonderful characters who will eventually jostle with Buffy Summers for screentime and development, and it is their current subservience to her growth which renders some of the frustration of this episode.

Also, the episode is just… confusing? The Billy story is surprisingly hard to follow, as my partner pointed out. Why should we care about this kid? Why is his backstory so convoluted? It’s played as a mystery, but it’s not as intriguing or elegant as previous mysteries, and just seem slapped together to give us the character time this episode has. The show will begin to do these perfunctory plots better as the show goes on, but right now, it’s both weirdly simple and overly complicated. As morgue mentions, it’s a pretty missed opportunity - by straying away from the high school, the story risks losing the plot of the show’s original concept, and is just a much less interesting story for it. Not a great look!

[ryanmeft]

Movie Review: Motherless Brooklyn

The greatest villains of noir are never the central antagonists. The corrupt cops, the slimy businessmen, and the small time hoods and assassins typified by the genre’s heyday are of course all vital to the seedy underrealms these movies sink us into, but the true villain is always the world itself, and specifically the rotten and festering systems whose waste drips down and creates the conditions for battered, weary detectives and crooks with no hope in the first place. This was implied in most classic noir, but Edward Norton’s Motherless Brooklyn makes it explicit. It focuses on a man seen by others as a freak, trying to do a good thing in a city that exists because of bad things. He’s up against such a vital underpinning of his entire world that he might as well be trying to punch out the moon.

Lionel Essrog is not exactly the first person you might choose in such a fight, even if one overlooks his Tourette’s syndrome, which in the decidedly unenlightened 1950’s is unlikely. He’s one of several detectives working for the aging Frank Minna (Bruce Willis), whose particular skills would have been equally applicable on the other side of the law. Also under Minna, in a crew the older man pulled from the morass of an abusive orphanage and led through World War II, are the force-and-bluster tough guy Tony Vermonte (Bobby Cannavale), who has an interesting relationship with Minna’s widow (Leslie Mann); the sharp information-gathering Danny Fantl (Dallas Roberts); and the reserved and slightly bumbling Gilbert Coney (Ethan Suplee). The film opens with a terribly thrilling sequence in which Minna seems to be trying to make a deal with some underworld figures, and as one might expect the deal goes wrong, resulting in Minna’s eventual death.

Let’s take a moment and look at that sequence. It takes up the first half hour or so of the film, and it takes its time. Essrog, played by Norton, listens in for a signal from Minna, and you know something is going to go wrong. Yet where other movies might make that a quick and easy scene, Norton gets our hopes up that Minna might live, and it is genuinely affecting when he doesn’t, because of how much he clearly meant to our protagonist. This death is more than just a device to set off the plot of the film. It defines Lionel’s key character traits: loyalty to those he trusts, suspicion towards most everyone else, all of the wariness that a lifetime of being infantilized by others would give a man. His character is not defined by Tourette’s, which, for the record, is presented accurately as the repetition of tics and phrases rather than by the cliche and rare repeating of profanity. His photographic memory is a tool for detective work, but also a burden; imagine never forgetting anything, and if you’ve suffered at all in life you might realize that isn’t a superpower. He wears his boss’s old hat and coat, in tribute to the man rather than to try and be him. Lionel is a fully developed character, and not a gimmick. The film is patient with him and with the plot, the kind of patience lacking in modern films where audiences will sit for more than two hours only if computer effects are involved.

His case is no gimmick, either, but a fully developed and twisted web that goes, of course, up to the Very Top. The central question: why was Minna, ostensibly a licensed private eye, talking to mobsters as if they were dealing with each other? Lionel digs into this, and it becomes clear it involves the city’s powerful planning commissioner, Moses Randolph (Alec Baldwin). He seems able to demand whatever he wants from the government, behaves like a Godfather instead of a public servant, and is involved in the demolition of slums. Ostensibly, the plan is to provide better housing for the mostly black residents, an assertion which is challenged by two people. The first is wary-but-idealistic housing activist Laura Rose (Gugu Mbatha-Raw), who develops a connection with Lionel that feels true and complex and not like an obligatory screenplay romance. Mbatha-Raw is a seriously undervalued actress, and here she represents the counter-culture of jazz, which was primarily African-American and seen as degenerate at the time. Her uncle Billy (Robert Wisdom) and cool-as-ice trumpet-playing friend (Michael K. Williams) have some level of insight into what exactly is happening to Brooklyn’s poor black population, and they become allies. It must be noted that scenes in nightclubs are handled perfectly, feeling like the close, crowded, smoky places that jazz clubs should be.

The second is a ragged man with a frantic voice named Paul (Willem Dafoe), who appears at meetings and angrily whips the crowd into frenzies against Moses. He lays out what crooked deals are going on, but encourages Lionel to be the one to stop it; he cannot, for reasons that will be revealed. I found him the most fascinating supporting character on the canvas, and a perfect role for Dafoe. In movies, most of the good-aligned characters we meet will eventually abandon all self-centered interests and heroically join the cause at great self-sacrifice. Film noir is decidedly unsuited to such sentiment, but in the old days often suffered from it nonetheless. Paul is the apotheosis of that: he is legitimately angry at the conspiracies he sees, but has been too hurt by his own failures to fix them in the past, and now wants to pass the buck so he does not have to suffer any more losses. In our heart of hearts, most of us know we are more like Paul.

Earlier I mentioned the look of the jazz world, but I must mention the look of the rest of the world, as well. Regular Mike Leigh cinematographer Dick Pope films a mid-century New York reproduced by production designer Beth Mickie, that is lost, where boat-sized cars rumble down narrow streets and dark shadows are hidden in the eaves of bridges and corners of doorways. Lionel is at one point invited to meet with Moses to strike a deal, and Moses’ office is as spacious as the rest of the city is not; in an excellent wide shot, he patrols this throne room as a king, passing judgments and decisions entirely as it pleases him. This is not a man who will fall like a typical movie crook, and indeed the film leaves open whether Lionel succeeds at all.

Norton, who is friends with novelist Jonathan Lethem, has, with the author’s consent, done what a filmmaker should: used the parts of the book that suit, and changed those that did not. Most notably, he has moved the 90’s setting (this project has been long gestating) to the 1950’s and wrapped up the plot in one of our great modern national stains, the New York housing discrimination that still affects the African-American community today. The parallels are both obvious and buried, and though Norton has discussed the connections between Moses and Donald Trump, this is not an overtly political picture. It is instead a deeply involving mystery with highly engaging characters and an intriguing world, that happens to have greater points under the surface for those who are looking.

Verdict: Highly Recommended

Note: I don’t use stars, but here are my possible verdicts.

Must-See

Highly Recommended

Recommended

Average

Not Recommended

Avoid like the Plague

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[suckerforsaikik]

Hypothetically, HYPOTHETICALLY, if someone were to write a Saiki Kusou no Psi nan crossover with assassination classroom. In your opinion, what would be the funniest, clever or most mysterious way to integrate him into class 3-E? (Assuming you've read/watched the series that is).

(this took way too long because i ended up binging the whole series for ‘research’)

Summary: Saiki tries to hide his psychic powers from the assassination classroom when he finds himself in their world.

Saiki needed to stop getting himself into these situations. He didn’t know which gods felt the need to torment him like they did, but an angry letter of complaint to their office wasn’t enough to make up for what happened.

It started as soon as he woke up. Approximately 0.0076 seconds after he got out of his bed, Saiki had noticed something wasn’t right.His limiter had fallen out during his sleep, and was now partially under the pillow. His bed and the better chunk of his room were submerged in sand, which went on for miles. Using his clairvoyance, Saiki still couldn’t see any people for a good 50 kilometres. He had found himself in the middle of the desert.

“Yare yare, I must’ve teleported.”

He then had tried teleporting to his house, but he couldn’t find it. He went through the whole neighbourhood, but his dad and mom didn’t seem to… exist? He even checked the whole country, But popping up all over Japan attracted the attention of a few parties.

And that eventually ended up with him here, With a government agent prattling on about whatever threat the world faced. After revealing his telekinesis on a surveillance camera (thankfully they never found out about his teleportation), the government of Japan had noticed him, and had immediately dragged him to a secret government bunker, talking about how they knew he had special powers. Not that he was listening. Instead, he was worrying over what had happened to everyone he know. The latest theory he had come up with was he had hopped a dimension. It only happened once before, and ended with him running from powerful espers from the 7th division of Claw. He soon realized it would take a day to get back to his normal dimension when he was trying to get back, so that was probably the minimum amount of time he’d have to spend here.

“What a cliche trope”  Saiki sighed. “I’ll just have to play along, I guess”

“-the reward is 30 billion yen to kill that yellow monster. Will you do it?” The annoying side character agent, who introduced himself as Shiro, finished.

Saiki rolled his eyes. Even if he’d rather spend the day taking advantage of this universe’s coffee jelly, he knew he couldn’t escape the plot. If he tried running, he would just get dragged back into it for some stupid reason, or he’d be pulled into another, more ridiculous, story. It was the only thing that could beat him.

A nod confirmed his alliance.

“Excellent! I’ll get you prepared.” Saiki’s mind-reading abilities told him Shiro wasn’t the most mentally stable, but he figured he’d have a few episodes before Shiro went full crazy.

“Time to get you enrolled in the assassination classroom.”

—

(Somewhere in a sketchy government facility)

A bloodstained report smacked onto the desk of the prime minister.

“We have intel.” the spy who had delivered the file spoke, with his toque shading his eyes, and you could only see his dark pupils drilling down into your head.

“What’s it aboot?” The prime minister’s eyes had seen his fair share of wars, they were dark and unbreakable like a beaver’s den. He pulled the files toward him, examining the files with the intensity of as if they were tickets to a professional hockey game.

“The Japanese have been keeping secrets from us, sir. They have been hosting a dangerous octopus creature, who says they’ll destroy the Earth next March.”

“Those bastards.” The prime minister stood up from his desk, causing his chair to scrape the floor as it moved away from him.

“When I’m done with them, I’ll show them no mercy.” He furrowed his brows. “I’d bet a toonie they thought we couldn’t help because we’re a ‘peaceful’ country. I’ll show them… when we BLOW UP THAT MONSTER OURSELVES!!”

“How do you plan to accomplish that, sir?”

“Heat seeking missiles. We aim it right at the students so that damn octopus can’t escape, then we bomb the whole thing with anti-teacher pellets.”

“Sorry for doubting your plan, sir.”

“Sorry for making you doubt my plan.”

“Sorry.”

“Sorry.”

—

“I hear we’re getting another student transfer, Kayano!” Nagisa stopped to chat with his fellow student on the way to their mountain school.

“Do you think they’ll be normal this time?” Kayana said.

“Doubtful” Itona appeared. “The only transfer students we have are freaks. I had tentacles, Ritsu’s an assassination machine, and Karma has too many problems to be ‘normal’.” he listed the transfer students’ ‘quirks’ on his fingers.

“You might want to stop insulting me,” behind Itona, Karma stood. He smirked, then said “But I wouldn’t disagree.”

Everyone made their way to class, where KoroSensei was waiting.

“Hello class.” He tittered. “ The new transfer student comes today, and he has ALREADY challenged me to a fight, so we’re moving quite fast. Ooh, telekinesis? How intriguing!”

After staring at the note intently, KoroSensei held it up, showing japanese kanas spelling out the time and place for meeting, along with the students known powers.

“Now please be patient, everyone. The student should arrive right–”

The door to the classroom blew open. Shiro stepped into the scene, with Saiki a few seconds behind him, yet already regretting it.

“Hi.” Saiki said.

Stepping into the classroom, The minds of the students told Saiki about the previous fights of different rivals of Korosensei. All of them had failed, obviously. They tried to kill him, got beaten badly, then learned the value of friendship and working together. It seemed that was what was expected of him as a transfer. Saiki could at least help speed the process up.

‘Alright,’ he thought, ‘ I guess I have to do it.’

He held up his hands in surrender.

“Oh no. You are too strong, I can see it now. There is no way I can beat you. I’m so sorry, Shiro, I guess I’m giving up.” He walked off to the empty seat in the corner of the classroom, right next to a window. He smirked. A few more hours and he’d be out of this classroom .

“W-What?!” Shiro sputtered, stepping closer to Saiki with an intent to murder, “You’re supposed to fight. Get up and KILL HIM!!” he reached to grab Saiki’s shoulder’s before Korosensei’s tentacles pulled him away.

“You’re not allowed to hurt any of my students, Shiro.” Korosensei said, smiling. “Please excuse yourself from this classroom.”

Shiro left, albeit slowly. Saiki’s recently created plan was going well.

As Korosensei started the lesson, a student with flashy red hair (‘Karma Akabane’ Saiki noticed) leaned over to talk to him from the other desk.

“So, I heard you had telekinesis.” Karma face was two inches from Saiki. Saiki couldn’t really deny his powers here. He nodded.

“Interesting!” His face was now just an inch away. “Can I have an example?”

Yare yare. Saiki waved his hands, and a spoon flew into his hand from a nearby lunchbox. Letting go of it so it could float on its own, the metal spoon bent before Karma’s widening eyes. He let out a gasp,  making everyone turn to see the spoon that was levitating thanks to a certain psychic’s powers. Now he had an audience.

“Wow! I guess it’s true. How much power do you have?  Can you lift a car? A train? Could you fix the moon?”

“Why would I need to-” Shoot. That was close to revealing himself as an outsider. His telepathy showed him the broken crescent moon that all the class was thinking about. Could he fix it? He would have to take out his limiter and turn it back seven years, though it wouldn’t be hard theoretically. But if he said yes, that would mean they would ask him to fix it. It also wouldn’t make sense to how he could fix a whole moon and not defeat a yellow octopus man. Lying was the better option here. “I mean, no, Nothing bigger than spoons.”

“Um, okay.” The whole class was staring at him now. He could tell they were suspicious. He just had to switch the subject, and then they would forget.

“So what are those weird pink balls on your head?”

Shoot. He had forgotten to telepathically suggest they were hairpins. Being the center of attention was too dangerous.

“They’re my hairpins.” Everyone seemed to accept that, thank the gods.

“Wow! Can I pull them out and see them?” one classmate reached for his head.

“No.”

Yare yare. He might not survive today.

—

As Saiki was being tortured by the students of 3-E, Korosensei was sitting read The Great Gatsby. Even when he was thoroughly enjoying his book, his nose caught the faint smell of chemicals. Normally this wouldn’t be the biggest issue, but the chemicals were a fuel-oxidizer mixture, they were up in the air, and they were coming closer at a rate too fast to be a plane. Missiles, then. He could smell out the steam of infrared electricity, so they were heat-seeking missiles, specifically. Why would anyone send heat-seeking missiles to him? He didn’t produce that much heat, so the missile would more likely go to actual people like-

The children.

They were aiming for the schoolchildren, to keep him here. Korosensei couldn’t smell it now, but he bet there was also an anti-sensei missile searing through the sky towards him.

How could he solve this? He needed to stop the missiles, firstly. Should he tell the students? No, that would only worry them about problem with an obvious solution.

He flew off from his desk in the classroom. At Mach 20, disabling the missiles would be easier than stopping them physically with his lack of strength. Then he would have to bury them in the ocean, or maybe space. Speeding up to the closest missile, he noticed a Canadian flag design on its side.

“Canada, hmm? It’s always the quiet ones.”

He tried to open up the hatch to the missiles wires, but his tentacles burst as he touched the metal plating.

“Anti-sensei plating.” that made it harder. He could go back and grab his napkin to hold it, but he couldn’t navigate the wire system accurately with such a huge handicap. The only option was to evacuate the students and hopefully get out of the missiles range.

He flew back to the classroom, where a certain psychic was sitting.

Of course, Saiki knew about the missiles. With a quick check using clairvoyance, he counted 3 in total. Heading straight for them at about Mach 15. There was enough explosives to decimate the whole mountain. Korosensei may try and save all his students, but there were only 20 seconds left. He wouldn’t make it.

Korosensei quickly shoved his students out the door of the classroom.  He talked quickly as he persuaded them out of the building, but he was too agitated to fully explain the situation. Now there were 15 seconds. The missiles could be seen before Saiki and rest of the students were all outdoors. Everyone immediately realized what KoroSensei had been trying to do, and started to sprint, but no one here was fast enough to escape except Korosensei, and he would not abandon his students. 10 seconds. They seemed to realize the couldn’t outrun their death, so they just stood, motionless, wondering what would happen next. Less than 5 seconds left.

—

Saiki knew he had to do it. They would question it, and ask him why he hadn’t used his powers. But even if he hated confrontation, and talking, and socializing, that wouldn’t matter if they were dead. His rule of not interfering would be broken, but he could make an exception. No matter what excuse he made to himself, he knew he wouldn’t run away.

Two seconds left.

Saiki calmly stepped forwards to the missiles, putting himself in front of all his classmates. His hands stretched out before him. Like they were frozen in time, all three missiles slowed to a stop, five feet away from the students they were to kill.

But that was only a temporary solution. Taking out his limiter, Saiki set the missiles to seven years in the past. Plates of metal materialized to take their place, and fell to the grass. The clattered onto the ground unceremoniously

No one spoke.

“Wow.” Karma was the first to break the silence, “One question. How?”

“I’m uh… not from around here.” Saiki fiddled with his hands too much to be normal. He’d rather get hit by a missile than be asked awkward questions in front of a crowd.

“You’re American??!”

“No, that’s-” Why was everyone so stupid? “A bit farther than that.”

“You’re an alien!!”

“No…(Yare yare) well, close enough.”

“So why?” Nagisa asked. He seemed to have completely recovered from the shock of certain death, and now stood in his usual pose. Not cocky or reserved, but unfazed.

“Why what?”

“Why would you lie?”

“Because then you’d ask me to kill KoroSensei,” This much talking and honesty was getting uncomfortable. He might end up teleporting away from his problems.

“You can?”

Korosensei had gotten over the attempted bombing of his students and his regular smile was now imprinted on his face. “Now now, class, I’m sure he wouldn’t be able to,” he coughed. “So you aren’t remaining to study with our class?”

“No, I have 20 hours left in this universe”

“So you’re staying with us until then.”

“I was going to go and grab some coffee jelly from-”

“Great! We can teach you some assassination moves!”

They started to forcefully drag Saiki up the mountain, back into the classroom.

“So Saiki,” Karma said, in a cheery tone, “Can you fix the moon?”

“Yes, I’m powerful enough to.”

“Will you fix it, please?”

“No.”

[takerfoxx]

Gonna knock off some big ones here! The fav(s) of the day are...

BOBA FETT!

Okay guys, let’s get this out straight out of the gate. I grew up as a major Star Wars fan. My dad is an old-school sci-fi nerd and it really rubbed off on me. Classic science fiction was our bread and butter growing up, and the Star Wars movies were no exception. We must’ve watched those suckers a gazillion times.

And the expanded universe? Oh, I was all over that shit! And I mean the old stuff! The Truce at Bakura, the Heir to the Empire trilogy, the Kyp Durron trilogy, both the Han Solo and Lando Calrissian trilogies (there were a lot of trilogies), Darksaber, Planet of Twilight, Shadows of the Empire, The Courtship of Princess Leia, Young Han Solo, Splinter of the Mind’s Eye, the Young Jedi Knight series, all of the Tales books, Galaxy of Fear, even less well regarded stuff like The Crystal Star. All that and more filled my bookshelves.

But like many young Star Wars fans, my boy was the guy that got like four lines of dialogue and quickly gets killed off in the first half of the third film.

It’s hard to really articulate what made Boba Fett so appealing. I think it’s part of the air of mystery around him. In Empire, he strides in with a totally badass design, is the guy to track down and capture the heroes, backtalks Darth Vader and gets away with it, and escapes with one of the main characters in tow. I guess that caused people to become intrigued by him and want to see what he would do in the last film. And sure enough, he shows up looking all cool and mysterious, flies into a direct confrontation with both Luke Skywalker and Han Solo, seems to get the upper hand...and is summarily dispatched by a fluke accident.

Lame.

So I guess many who would become Star Wars writers were, like myself, let down by this, and sought to “correct” this by giving ol’ Boba his own mythos, complex history, cast of closely-related characters, and make it so that he escaped the damn worm and would go on to cross paths with the heroes in every obligatory “The one with Boba Fett!” entry in every long-running Star Wars book series ever.

And boy, did I eat it up!

The Bounty Hunter Wars! An entry in both Tales From the Bounty Hunters and Tales From Jabba’s Palace! Endless comics! The aforementioned obligatory Boba Fett books! All of this created a character that became almost revered by the fandom, who cast a shadow over the whole multi-verse. I bought the books, played with the toys, and even wrote a short little Boba Fett story in sixth grade. I mean, this guy was just cool.

Needless to say, I’m not the Star Wars fan I once was. I mean, the only one of these movies since RotJ that I’ve actually liked is also one of the least popular, so that’s a thing. Hell, I was debating putting up a Star Wars entry to begin with. But man, even if I’m not all that into Star Wars anymore, it can’t be denied that for a time it reigned supreme, and Boba Fett was, in my world, the king.

(Though lowkey, it was kind of hilarious watching writers try to reconcile the already established Boba Fett origin with the one created by the prequels after Attack of the Clones dropped)

He’s no good to me dead.

Also...

DARTH REVAN!

So I went from almost not doing a Star Wars entry to doing one with multiple characters. Yeah, go figure.

All right. So, Knights of the Old Republic is probably my last great foray into Star Wars before sort of slipping out of the fandom. It was recommended to me by a work friend, so I popped over to EB Games (remember them?), grabbed up a used copy, popped it into my X-Box, and...

I think I averaged about eight hours a day on those games. Each of them.

It was one of the best gaming experiences I’ve ever had, a wholly new Star Wars story taking place centuries before the films (and yet somehow still having the same technology level) that features none of the classic characters, but still felt very much Star Wars, but also its own thing: a sprawling space adventure as you, the apprentice Jedi, joins up with a ragtag group of companions and travel the galaxy trying to thwart a rogue Sith Lord from finding some long lost superweapon. The worlds you visit! The characters you meet! The quests, the leveling, the force powers, the plot, everything was just so fresh and so cool!

And then you get to the twist, a twist that is now notorious for being one of the best twists in gaming history: finding out that you aren’t just some new Jedi rising up to stop a Sith Lord: you are actually DARTH MOTHERFUCKING REVAN, the Sith Lord that was the master of the current Sith Lord, long thought dead but had actually been captured, mind-wiped and reprogrammed by the Jedi! What do you do with this new information? Well, that’s up to you!

Needless to say, when this was revealed in the game, I started screaming, and screaming loudly. What a twist! What a game-changer! 

Now granted, being the PC of an RPG means that Revan’s personality was decided by the player’s choices, so he didn’t get much of a canon personality of his own, but that still doesn’t change the fact that he’s the centerpoint of one of the coolest pieces of the Star Wars EU that there is, and that’s worth a lot in my opinion.

Also, Bastila was bae, just sayin’. Sort of a proto-Serana, if you ask me.

(note: yes, I know about his role in SWTOR and don’t care for it. No, I haven’t read the novels yet, but I do intend to)

Honor is a fool's prize. Glory is of no use to the dead.

And finally...

GRAND ADMIRAL THRAWN!

The Heir to the Empire is the granddaddy of the OG Expanded Universe. I mean, Splinter of the Mind’s Eye technically came first, but no one remembers that. No, it was all about Timothy Zahn’s epic follow-up to the original Star Wars trilogy, which set the gold standard for the series for years to come and also introduced several of its most iconic characters. Mara Jade? She came from here. Talon Kardde? Also here.

And then you have the trilogy’s centerpiece, Grand Admiral Thrawn.

It’s sort of interesting how iconic Thrawn has become as a Star Wars villain, given how different he is from all of them. I mean, he’s not a Sith. Hell, he’s not force sensitive at all. He’s a military officer, in a series where they tend to be treated as expendable underlings. But through actually using his brain, studying his opponents’ strategies and cultures, making use of the resources available to him, and actually being fair to his subordinates, he’s gone on to almost rival Darth Vader in popularity in some circles. A brilliant tactician who managed to (mostly) overcome the Empire’s prejudice against non-humans through sheer efficiency, he came incredibly close to bringing the New Republic to its knees simply by outplaying them at every turn. His knack for figuring out his opponents’ thought process simply through studying their cultures’ works of art was inspired, and those who tried to outsmart him often came to regret it. What was more, he also was surprisingly honorable, having a strict moral code. He simply believed that the Empire was the best way to run things, and acted accordingly. Though don’t let that fool you into thinking that he wasn’t just as ruthless as anyone else in the Empire. He was just smarter than most about it.

While there was admittedly a lot of crap in the EU that Disney was wise to get rid of, losing characters like Thrawn was a major blow, which was why it was so awesome to see him return in the Rebels tv show. I literally have seen videos of grown men crying with joy just through watching his reveal trailer. And while I don’t have the time or means to watch Rebels for myself, I do want to give it a go sometime in the future, and Thrawn is a big part of that.

But it was so artistically done.

[kbrown78]

Monthly Wrap Up: June

Okay, so I'm actually a bit surprised that the month turned out the way it did. After the past couple of months, I accepted that wasn't likely to read a total of more than 5 books. This month I was able to read a whopping total of 15 books. 15! I haven't read that many books since January. Granted 2 of those books were DNF, one was a short classic, and another was only 7 pages, but still it's an impressive amount for the month. As for ratings it was all over the place. I had everything from a 1 star DNF to even a 5 star book, but the majority of books fell in the middle with 3 stars. This was also a surprise because toward the middle of this month, I was just reading 1 and 2 star books back to back. I lost my enthusiasm for reading, resigned myself to the possibility that this would be a horrible reading month, and even went a few days where I didn't read anything. After soon detox time, I pushed through and even managed to end the month on a relatively good note. Also got back on track with the reading challenges. I read a total of 6 books for the PopSugar Reading Challenge and finished at least 1 of the books I set out for the Reading Frenzy's Pride Month Buzzword Challenge. Biggest achievement was completing my Goodreads Goal of reading 50 books within the year. By the end of this month I completed 60 books, and now I want to see if I can make it to 100. Probably won't but, it will be an amazing accomplishment. So despite a significant low point, June was actually a good month.

Armistice by Lara Elena Donnelly: The previous book Amberlough had been a thorough disappointment, and I was nervous this one would be the last straw for this series. In fact it came close to being the biggest disappointment of the month. If this book wasn't impressing me by the halfway point than I was just going to give up the series. That did not happen, in fact I really ended up enjoying this book. Continuing some time after the previous book (I honestly couldn't tell you how much time, probably no more than 5 years), we follow a few characters from the previous book in their new circumstances, as well as a new character with connections to all the old characters. As I said in my Monthly Wrap Up for May, characters were the driving force for this series, which is part of why the first book struggled, because the character weren't done well. In this book however, the characters are much better because they now have some sense of identity. Aristide and Cordelia were tolerable, if not a little likeable at times. Cordelia's clearly been through some tough times but keeps grinding through to achieve her goal of destroying the Ospies, and her skills are good enough to convince other to help her cause. Aristide seems to want out of the criminal life, enjoying a new life of luxury in film, but the past won't let go of him. The new character, Lillian, was fantastic, like without a doubt the best part of the book. I like how she's connected to the other characters, both with her profession and the fact that she's Cyril's sister. Her work with the press puts in several politically delicate situations, but she demonstrates the smarts and the drive to accomplish her goal of saving her son. Through her you also finally get some behind the scenes political machinations, something this entire series needs yet usually fails to deliver on. Onto one of the stronger aspects of this series, and that suprisingly is the romance. The series stretching relationship is Aristide and Cyril, and with Cyril being absent, you see how much Aristide is effected by Cyril's absence. While having the main relationship be a gay romance, my favorite relationship was between Lillian and Jinadh, a minor royalty from the lush, tropical country where half the books takes place (I think the name is Liso, but I honestly don't know). They have a history, which resulted in their son, but can't be together due to her profession and social taboo's in his country. Yet when they meet again they still feel the chemistry, they want a relationship. They have their differences but are willing to put it aside in order to get their son to safety. I also thought some things that the previous book struggled with where partially remedied in this book. There were actual examples of Ospie atrocities, actual political intrigue (but I still struggle to fully grasp what's going on), and complex motivations that make sense. The setting was lush and tropical, and again had that 1920s feel with the film industry and airplanes, but I still struggle with knowing anything about the world (I don't even know where half the book takes place). So while this book does greatly improve from the first one but it doesn't take things to the extent that it needs to and I'm more than a little worried about how the last book is going to go. Armistice received 4 out 5 stars.

City of Lies by Sam Hawkin: I wanted this to be a 5 star book. All of the reviews I read made it seem like it had the potential to be 5 stars, but it wasn't. Part of issue might have been how long to took to get through this book. First I kept putting off reading it because I was worried that I wouldn't love it and the beginning chapters were very involved and were also fairly long. Than in the middle of reading it I had to put this book on hold so that I could get through other books that I needed to finish in May. This constant delaying of the book contributed to the feeling of the plot dragging, but looking back at the plot itself, there really wasn't much action after the second half of this book except for in the last chapter. The whole story revolves around a murder mystery that begins shortly before the city is under siege. As our protagonists try to find the killer and stop the siege they must figure out who is loyal and delve into the dark secrets of their city. This was a book that had so much potential, it really could have been a 5 star book. Even as I was going over my tag notes for about the first quarter of the book I saw a tone of potential for the world and characters and really saw how nuanced the story and themes could have been. Then the story starts to drag on and on and really starts to show it's true colors as a debut novel. This all culminates in an extremely lackluster, completely out of left field climax with one saving grace scene. Everything in the first quarter of this book was great: the writing was detailed and intriguing but not overwhelming, the POV characters had some depth, with their own sets of assets and flaws, and were immediately put to the test with a change in circumstance, the world was rich and unlike so much grimdark fantasy that I've been reading by portraying that while there were relevant grievances against those in charge it wasn't all bad, and the whole emphasis on poisons was cool. The mystery for the majority of this book was actually done well, which I haven't really seen well done mysteries in SFF books. I was as lost as the protagonists were, it made sense why they couldn't figure out who was behind the conflict of the books, and everyone made for an equally believable. Then things shifted and for some reason the story starts to drag on and on, with the same points being reiterated over and over and no real progress is made, and really starts to show it's true colors as a debut novel. Characters lose their depth (and prominence), the conflict becomes more black and white in morality, new things are just thrown in with little development, and the mystery loses its suspense. This all culminates in an extremely lackluster, completely out of left field climax with one saving grace scene. I really wanted this to be a 5 star novel but it just wasn't. City of Lies received 3.5 out 5 stars and was my pick for the PopSugar prompt “debut novel.”

Gone by Michael Grant: Much like City of Lies, Gone was a book that had a 5 star start. You are immediately thrown into a tense and strange situation with all the other kids, who are now trapped within a confined area and everyone over the age of 15 has disappeared. Aside from trying to survive without adults, new threats emerge in the form of bullies, mutants, and a mysterious creature known only as The Darkness. I loved this series as teen, completely wrapped up in the action and the characters, and was really hoping it would live up to those expectations. It did, at first. The beginning really grabs you and doesn't let go. I didn't want to put the book down, I needed to read how everything played out, and I loved that. Things went downhill when they POV started shifting to less interesting characters and the story really started to lose its tension. Also as weeks have passed between me finishing the book, I find myself forgetting most of what happened and just not being attached to the characters. There were a few that were compelling but they were put aside for Sam and Caine's rivalry which was both clique and not well done. Once the series started slowing down, it never really recovered and even during a high stakes climax, which the entire book has been building up to, I wasn't as invested in the story as I was at the beginning. Above all else, this very much felt like a YA book, with the simple writing, archetypal characters, and underdeveloped plot. Gone received 3 out 5 stars and was my pick for the PopSugar prompt “about someone with a superpower.”

The Invisible Library by Genevieve Cogman: Here it comes, the inevitable 1 star DNF of the month. Though I will say this book wasn't bad, it just really wasn't for me. While I like warm books, I don't usually prefer light hearted books (another reason why I don't reach for contemporary). I will, however, still read these books if they fit the following conditions: they contain certain things within the narrative that I like, I'm aware that it's a light hearted story, and I'm in the mood for a light hearted story. I was not in the mood for that kind of story nor did I know the book would turn out to be one of those kind of stories. I went in there for the library bits because I am a book lover, and I think that is why many people are initially interested in reading this book. Unfortunately, the Library itself was hardly seen or utilized from what I read, so that things could focus on a book retrieval mission, which I found to be both absurd in its execution and boring. It felt like a bait and switch, intentionally drawing in readers with the promise of this really cool library that the story and characters revolved around only for it to actually be about a wacky retrieval mission and murder mystery in a weird alternate world. Which is a shame because what we see of the Library (lots of training with numerous people, vast sectors of different books from different worlds, the various classifications of different worlds based on magic/ chaos and technology, ancient meets modern) was really cool yet is completely underutilized and underdeveloped. Like, why is it so hard to write a good library setting? Seriously, the only good one I've ever seen was the Clayr Library in Lirael, and even that was underutilized. It's not just the bait and switch nature of the narrative that upset me, but literally everything else in the book was disappointing. The writing was so zaney, almost trying to emulate an episode of Doctor Who, and it was so absurd and over the top that it just grated on my nerves. Like for awhile Cogman seemed to be deliberately putting Liechtenstein in every other paragraph to sound clever and funny, but it became very irritating, very quickly. The world that the characters spend most of their time in could have been interesting, an alternate Steampunk London (still don't fully grasp why Victorian London is such a popular setting) with faries in it, but it was so focused on being as weird and over the top as possible that I couldn't enjoy the world, and we never really get much of a sense of what any of the other worlds are like. The character were at best lack luster and at worst irritating. I wanted to love Irene because she's a book lover, relies on her smarts, and I love those kind of characters, but she failed not just as a book lover but as a character in general. We are told Irene a book lover but never shown it, and other than her reading a few books, nothing is really known about her. I don't know really anything about her personality, her likes, her dislikes, her history, what she's like on missions. I don't even know what books she prefers to read or her opinions on various books. She was a very flat character that felt like a prop in the story. This emptiness is further extended  with her relationships. Her parents are always absent but she's not mournful or glad of this fact. She has no attachment to them, in fact she doesn't really show attachment to anyone. Like seriously, this woman seems to have no close friends despite the fact that she works in a large multi dimensional library with other book lovers. This again serves to make her come off as more of a cardboard cut out rather than a fully fleshed out character. The only other “relationship” we see is this petty rivalry she has with literally the only other on screen female. It was so annoying witnessing the only 2 female characters being catty toward each other. This may improve because the rival seems to stick around up to the latest book, but I couldn't stomach it with the rest of the book's contents. Despite how disappointing Irene was, Kai, her new partner, somehow managed to be worse. He was this smoldering guy, wearing a leather jacket and being incredibly gorgeous. He could have been interesting because apparently he's a dragon, or part dragon, but he's so forgettable outside of his looks that you have to be constantly reminded in the story that he is a dragon. The best thing I can say about him is that he wasn't a snarky jerk, but he was just devoid of personality. As far as I got there wasn't any romance going between Kai and Irene but I wouldn't be surprised if that's where it goes. This is a book where characterization, setting, and even plot are sacrificed in favor of writing in a particular style, and this felt a little insulting to me as a reader, but mostly the style just did not mesh well with me. Gave The Invisible Library 1 out 5 stars, since it's a DNF, and was my pick for the PopSugar prompt “favorite prompt from past reading challenge,” which asked for a book that features a library. One day I'll read a book with a good library!

Amnesty by Lara Elena Donnelly: While this wasn't a bad finale, it was disappointing. In fact this whole series was disappointing. I thought based on the covers, and the premise, and other people's review, the series would sweep me away with it's dazzling characters and plot. What should have been a firework, was a sad a little party popper. This book takes another time skip and takes place after the Ospie regime is put out, and follows various characters as the deal with the aftermath of the previous 2 books. All the issues that have plagued the previous books in the series were repeated in this one, and I was honestly over it. Focusing on how tragic mediocre characters are doesn't work if I don't care about them. Even after completing 2 books I didn't really know these characters, I didn't have a grasp of what made them tick, and I felt no attachment to them. While I was disappointed with the characters, the worst thing about this book, and really this entire series, was how the plot and themes were handled. If this book had focused on the election and all the political turmoil, or even the effect these events were actually having on citizens, it would have been a much stronger series. Unfortunately, readers are only given scraps of that narrative, while the author prioritizes the melodrama between characters. This is most telling with the climax, were the results of the current election aren't divulged, it's just left hanging in the void, but several chapters are dedicated to detailing the journey of 2 characters leaving the country. There were some interesting themes that had a lot of potential but aside from giving a few nods to it, there isn't anything done with them. Lillian was once again the only source of anything good in this book. It's through her that we get the election subplot, and I felt for her going managing sticky political situations while having to deal with her brother Cyril who's been labeled a war criminal. Honestly without Lillian, this entire series would have been only 1 or 2 stars. Potential isn't enough to carry a series, and when execution fails the end results are disappointing, which sums up not only this book but this entire series. Amnesty received 2 out 5 stars.

Space Opera by Catherynne M. Valente: This one is going to be short because there isn't a lot to say. I only managed to get about a third of the way into it, which I haven't done in years. Whenever I DNF I make an effort to get 50% of the way through so that the characters or plot has a chance to improve. The reason I quit at 33% was because my issues with the book had nothing to do with the characters or plot. The writing style was awful. It was pure word vomit, overloading the page with every word that sounded like it could fit, and some that didn't. The writing honestly starting resembling a Donald Trump speech with utilizing the quantity of words used (and how cool they sounded) versus the actual quality of word usage. It was about at that point that I had to put the book because I couldn't take it anymore and I knew that this was something that was not going to change as the book progressed. I honestly couldn't tell you anything about the characters or the plot, because everything was so weird. Granted I expected an eclectic writing style based on my experience with Valente's other novel, Deathless, and the general premise of this story, but it was so over the top it was just nauseating and unbearable. I've read a short story of Valente's and really liked that, but I just don't agree with her novels. Space Opera received 1 out 5 stars and was my pick for the PopSugar prompt “book about a game or puzzle,” since it's not about a game exactly but more about a competition.    

Hunger by Michael Grant: I don't have much to say about this one for a few reasons. I hit another mini reading slump because when I was reading this book I wasn't reading anything I was enjoying. This lead to me just skimming like the last half of this book so that it could be over. Even doing that, though,  this book still lacked the level of action that the first book had set up. Not to say that there wasn't some significant things that occurred, but I really think this book suffered from second book syndrome. This book picks up immediately where the first book left off, all the kids still trying to survive in the FAYZE with dwindling resources and Caine recovering from his previous defeat and plotting against Sam. Most of the book is similar to the first one, kids being kids and not really managing things and different power struggles, and once again things being built up just to serve their purpose in the climax, which I think is the biggest fault of this book. Nothing was organically developed, the story seemed to drag on and at slow pace (despite the majority of the book literally taking place within 24 hours), characters were being stupid and generally assholes (heroes and villains), and there was a lot of forgettable material in this book. The saving grace of the previous book was the strong beginning, which this book lacked. The only saving grace of this book was that there were some compelling themes, but even that's a bit of stretch because they were once again poorly developed. After finishing this book I was really tempted to quit the whole series, which is telling of how frustrated I was with this entire book. I will at some point continue with this series, but I need to take a little time off after completing this disappointment. Hunger received 2 out 5 stars.  

Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu: Close to the beginning of the year I was wanting to read a classic novel each month to widen the genre of books I read each month and get back into regularly reading classics like I used to in high school. I read Little Women, but that was really it. Last month Barnes and Noble had a sale on classics, so I picked up a couple that I really wanted to get. This one was the first one I read, and is actually a reread. I first read it for a literature course I had to take in college and I really liked. I liked the soothing tone it set and I found it to be a very thought provoking classic (even if I didn't always agree with what it was advocating). I figured I would probably enjoy rereading it and I think I liked it even more the second time. It's got a very serene tone, the philosophies presented are quite humbling and ones I think should be implemented in daily life (to certain extent), and it makes in interesting contrast to Confucianism with both having their virtues and weaknesses. There was supplemental reading that went along with the edition that I had, which I definitely think helped improve my reading experience because it added context to much of what I was reading. It's the kind of classic that you can see why it has lasted so long, and that you can enjoy reading because of it's simplicity and calm tone. Tao Te Ching received 5 out 5 stars.    

The Lottery by Shirley Jackson: Initially I intended to read this book in September to help get ready for the eerie October reads I have planned. Then I noticed I'm behind on my PopSugar Challenge, so I wanted to do some quick reads to catch up. I looked up this one to see how long it is and it's only 7 pages, so I definitely gave this one a quick read. There's a lot you can break down even in this short story, and I like that. I always like something that gives me food for thought, and this work in just a few pages manages to do that better than some works do in over 400 pages. It manages it tackle and satirize themes of tradition and war, again, in such a small amount of pages. Suspense was also something done really well, which I did expect because it's a Shirley Jackson. At the beginning everything seems fine but then the story starts building up this sinister feeling around the lottery until the horrifying reveal of what the lottery actually is. It's an intelligent, satirical, chilling piece of short fiction that I think everyone should read. This book made a brief appearance on Netflix's Haunting of Hill House, which is another book by Jackson I want to get to later this year, but also thought it was a clever nod to Jackson's stories, and fits perfectly for the PopSugar prompt “book you saw someone else on TV reading.” The Lottery received 4.5 out of 5 stars.

Red Rising by Pierce Brown: Going into this reread I knew it wasn't going to be as good as I remembered. Despite this, and some frustrating aspects, I still managed to find it somewhat enjoyable. It has a rather generic dystopian premise, a boy at the bottom of the hierarchy rebelling against his leaders, there's something about the story that adds enough of a breath of fresh air for it to be engrossing. This book's greatest strength is definitely it's action and pacing. I was never bored while reading it and at least when there was a filler chapter, it was over quickly. It kept adding new twists and turns, creating multiple conflicts for the protagonist, Darrow. As for Darrow himself, he's a character that I both like and dislike. He's arrogant and stupid, but it feels in character and fits quite well for the series as a whole. He's generally a well intentioned person who is fighting for a good cause so you want him to win, but the book does display him as almost being too perfect. Speaking of which, I didn't like most of the side characters, especially the women, because their entire characterization revolved around Darrow. The core trait of every woman was that she's beautiful. Either kind and beautiful or evil and beautiful but always beautiful. It was really annoying, and I wanted more from these characters. The only one I liked was Sevro, who was really an underdog and weirdo, but didn't seems to care. The story in this first book is really an underdog story about overcoming the odds, which is straight forward and something people are both familiar with and inclined to like. The world was kind of cool, a sort of Roman Empire in space, that actually felt like the Ancient Rome and appreciated seeing that. While this book is a bit too shallow for me to love, it's a fun, quick read that can help pull you out of a slump. Red Rising received 3 out 5 stars and was my first book for the Reading Frenzy Pride Month Buzzword challenge, which asked you to read a book with a color in the title.  

The Queen of the Tearling by Erika Johansen: Oh boy, this one was a hot mess.  Much like the previous book, I knew I wasn't going to like this one, in fact I was almost sure I was going to hate it. Unlike Red Rising, however, which balanced out things I thought were good with things I thought could have been improved, this book only had a sparse few moments of compelling narrative but was jammed full of stuff that just made me angry. So the series is about Kelsea, a 19 year old who has been raised in isolation until the day she ascends to the throne. When she does become queen she discovers that her kingdom is in massive disarray and full of corruption. As she tries to work and internal problems and avoid assassination attempts, she also must address the looming war she will likely have with her powerful and mysterious neighbor, the Queen of Mort. While, there were several issues I had with Kelsea (which I will get into in a second) there were a few good moments with her. As a book lover, I was glad to see a ruler who wanted to put an emphasis on education, deeply valued her collection of books, and even worked with the church (which she makes clear her distrust of) to start something of a library system. That's something that I liked not just because of my own love of books but because it's good to see a ruler with those values and implementing them. The other thing was Kelsea ending the Mort Treaty when she learns what it means for her people. It's a tricky situation, and one she probably could have handled better, but I do admire her for sticking to her morals and doing what she believes is right. Feels a bit like Danerys Targyern (before she got power hungry). And that's about it. That was honestly all I enjoyed about the book. Other than what I just talked about everything else in this book actively frustrated me. Characters are very flat, usually either being written as angsty or evil (and those evils ones always being sluts), the plot has a ton of holes in it (biggest example being Kelsea raised in total isolation for 19 years) and generally dragged on with very little action despite the books length, and the world building was, in a word, bad. I'm not going into a detailed rant here, talking about all the issues I had with this book, but there is something I want to go into a little more depth with and that's Kelsea herself. Kelsea has to be one of the worst protagonists I have ever read. She's supposed to be intelligent, or at least book smart, yet consistently makes stupid decisions. She's a condescending brat who insults everyone around her, which isn't a smart idea since she's a brand new ruler. Insists on doing everything her way, and has mini tantrums when it doesn't go her way. Above all else is her hypocritical ways and her obsession with her appearance, considering her attractive mother beneath her for focusing on vanity, but Kelsea spends most of the time focusing on her own plain appearance (which is emphasized at every opportunity and usually in the worst way) and insults other people's appearance. Also when she's talking to her attractive servants who had previously been abused because of their beauty and they try to warn her of that, she completely disregards them, only wanting to be gorgeous. Kelsea is the kind of character this book tries to say is a savior figure, but all the narrative does is present her as a hypocritical brat that shouldn't be within a mile of the throne. I knew this book was going to be bad after reading some reviews, but I didn't think it would absolutely tank. The Queen of the Tearling received 1 out 5 stars.

Wild Beauty by Anna-Marie McLemore: Going into this one I knew little, only that it was a magical realism because that's what McLemore usually writes and there's a curse on this family that causes their lovers to disappear but something changes when a boy shows up. Also you can tell flowers are going to be a central motif based on the colors and title. The flower's provided beautiful imagery and I liked what the meant to the girls and the land of La Pradera. In fact this novel's imagery was probably the best thing about it. It felt distinct, quiet, personal, lush, and colorful. I also liked the family dynamics in this book. All these women tied to the land and each other by the curse that has plagued them for generations. This has the double effect of making them intimately close with each other, but also dislike and distrust each other. I felt their pain just as much as I felt their love. Speaking of love, I also liked Estrella and Fel's dynamic at the start (and only at the start) of the book. Fel mysteriously shows up in their garden, meets Estrella and the 2 quickly develop an odd connection, both being plagued by their pasts in different ways. For a little while I wasn't sure if they were going to become lovers or platonic soul mates, and that's what made me like the 2 of them together because I would be happy with either. I also liked some the themes presented in the first half of the story and how they were handled (within the first half). That being said there was one thing I didn't like and that was Bay. She was kind of annoying and artificial, this figure that all the girls put up on this pedestal, and I honestly found the  Nomeolvides girl's obsession with her (yes obsession, not love) more than a little irritating. Also Estrella was really the only one in the group of girls that stood out to me. The rest were just kind of there, and I would have liked more development of them. The ending was what really dropped the rating of the book. Standalone novels are hard to cram a good, complete plot into, and magical realism tends to sacrifice plot for atmosphere. At the start, Wild Beauty had a vague plot that was slowly developing but there was solid direction with good themes and great atmosphere. Then it took a hard right and the plot seemed to be trying to hard to have something happen at the price of sacrificing everything else and the message took a dark and almost destructive meaning, the girls ripping out everything that makes them who they are. At the end Estrella makes it clear that she has no sense of self love, in fact she seems to hate herself even more because of something she wasn't aware or responsible for. That left a very bad taste in my mouth. The romance also seemed to fall apart in the end too. I already went in with certain expectations, but was still okay with romance. At the end, Estrella's self hatred seems to add an unnecessary amount of angst, and even has a toxic feel to it. It also feels very rushed, though I can't say exactly why. This was a pleasant novel with a solid start that unfortunately was bogged down by an unnecessarily depressing and empty ending. Wild Beauty received 3 out of 5 stars and was my pick for the PopSugar prompt “plant in title or on cover.”  

The Invasion of the Tearling by Erika Johansen: Not since last year have I read a series that has made me so enraged. This series is an amalgamation of lazy, generic world building, toxic tropes, and ripping off of other popular works. There's honestly too many issues in this book to properly go over in a Monthly Wrap Up. There did manage to be a few slightly redeemable aspects but even those were tainted by the rest of the writing. Kelsea started to develop interesting parallels to the Red Queen, but Kelsea became on awful character who showed her true colors. She's petty, violent, doesn't listen to anyone, and isn't as bright as she likes to think she is, yet other praise her as being the True Queen. Also having read the final book, I know that things don't get better, which makes me dislike her even more. The only other character that remotely stands out in my mind is Lily, a character from our world shown in flashbacks. Her narrative is basically a Handmaid's Tale rip off, but she at least seems to have a little more drive. The other character I thought I would like was Ewen, a mentally slow prison guard because he's a sweet bean who always does what is right, but he didn't stand out to me as much this time. This book also really pushes the anti religion message. This could be an interesting theme, because religion and those in charge are capable of doing both good and bad, but it's done in such a black and white manner that all good will of the message Johansen is trying to deliver goes flying out the door. This one's arguably my least favorite book in the series, just because I was so mad after reading it. It's just another example of why I'm always cautious about hyped books, because they are rarely worth the hype they get. The Invasion of the Tearling gets 1 out 5 stars.

Golden Son by Pierce Brown: I was a bit surprised I enjoyed this one as much as I did. Not that I thought I would dislike it, but this book still managed to get a reaction from me. Continuing a year after the events of the previous book, Darrow must maintain his persona as a Gold while hiding his true heritage as a Red. With mounting tension between various faction, war seems to be an inevitable outcome. The start was slow and a bit painful, there was some convoluted moments, but the book overall keeps up the momentum that the previous book developed. This was also the book that made me respect Brown as an author. Darrow still has the same flaws, because that's just who he is, but now he's starting to see consequences. The themes become more developed, mostly focusing on the fine line between revolution and terrorism, imbalance of power leading to civil war, and breaking caste systems. Brown also clearly tried to develop the side characters more, especially the females. However this ultimately falls a bit short and I think the main reason for that is because the entire story is told from Darrow's perspective, who is seeing the world and people through his own distorted filter. That specific element is I think biggest fault this series has. On a good note, the ending of this book was without a doubt the best moment of this entire series, it's the darkest moment and was done perfectly. Even knowing what happened, I was still shaking from the anticipation. It's a book with enough solid assets to balance out the flaws, and is possibly my favorite book in the series. Golden Son received 3.5 out 5 stars and was my second book for the Reading Frenzy's Pride Buzzword Challenge.    

The Fate of the Tearling by Erika Johansen: I'm worn out by this series. I knew I was going to hate this book because even when I first completed the series and still liked the first 2 books, I thought this one was incredibly disappointing. I skimmed most of this book, and outright skipped sections in a certain characters perspective, because I just wanted to complete this series. Like honestly the story repeats the same issues as the previous books with new issues in pacing (moving very rapidly), character arcs (stagnates and does nothing), the ending (huge cop out), the origins of the “magic” crystals (confusing and just doesn't work) and the villains. The main villain was actually the one interesting thing about this story because he could have been this eerie mysterious force or could have been at the center of a compelling conflict about power and politics, and he just wasn't. He was irritating brat who thought way too highly of himself (spurned on by his nut case of a mother) and is another reflection of the poor writing that plagues this entire series. I didn't actively hate this book like the previous one but that's only because I was tired from this series. This is a series where I honestly don't understand the hype and don't know why I liked it so much the first time I read it other than the hype. Disappointing book and sub par series. The Fate of the Tearling received 1 out 5 stars.  

[jisuwuu]

a little jealousy - Chwe Vernon

anon request: can I request a Vernon smut imagine where he usually doesn’t get jealous and he tried not to show (you both are idols) but one day he just got too jealous and you know then smut

author’s note: hi! this took longer than expected and it reached 2.6k words. i hope its okay and enjoy your smut!!

pairing: vernon x idol female!reader feat. nct and oc

warnings: swearing, smut under the cut uwu

SUMMARY: After your stage performance, you come across some of your trainee friends from the past. Vernon was already having problems and when he found out that you were with nct, he invites you over back to the dorms to rest. Sort of.

“Flowers under the moonlight, MOON FLOWER! Thank you everyone!” You and eight other girls bowed in front of the hundreds of fans that attended your music bank promotions. Today was the start of your 3rd full length album promotions. After having four months to prepare for this very much anticipated comeback, your group, MOON FLOWER was able to go up on stage again and perform. Not to mention that this would go on for about a month.

MOON FLOWER just finished performing your title track for this album, artwork. With such an innocent title who would’ve thought that the concept was very.. dark.

Artwork was produced by you and the other members with the help of Woozi, a member of SVT who is also under the same company as you. The song’s concept connects with your other albums mysterious storyline. In your newest song, it mainly talks about the sinful plan of the devil to captivate you and your members through a painting. Not only that, the song you just happened to perform earlier was very sexy. Which was too much for your liking. Though, you couldn’t protest against it as your company had already made the settlements and you couldn’t suggest anything less intriguing that could still connect with the plot line.

Turns out it wasn’t only you who felt uncomfortable with your song. Your boyfriend, Hansol or also known as Vernon from Seventeen, was also having problems while watching your performance on tv from your group’s waiting room. One of which, he was jealous. Jealous that the whole world would be looking at you in ways only he wanted to see. Throughout the performance, Vernon stayed or tried to stay calm. Even if the other members that tagged along with him going to the music bank to watch you perform were teasing him, he stayed composed. He hated showing his jealous side, he didn’t want to hurt his pride.

After waving goodbye to the fans in front of you, all nine of you walked back to your waiting room where you wanted to rest for a while before continuing with your own plans for the day. Luckily your next scheduled promotion would be three days from now. While walking through the corridors, nct, your trainee friends and junior greeted.

“Y/N sunbaenim!” Doyoung, one of the NCT members called you out. Making you turn your head only to be greeted by 18 boys. “Hello, Doyoung!” You greeted back, your members signaled you to go ahead and chat with your previous trainee friends while they would take the time to rest.

“Its been such a long time. We watched your performance and it was great! You improved a lot.” Taeyong, their leader noted giving you a warm smile despite his dark outfit.

“Thanks, you guys also did a great performance! By the way, your group expanded, really. SM wasn’t joking when he said infinite members.” You laughed, causing the members to motion to the six of the members.

“Yeah, Hansol left the company before we debuted and we got added six other people into our group.” Johnny spoke. The boys motion for the six to introduce themselves, since you haven’t met them because you left before they got accepted into the company.

“Hi~ I’m Chenle!”

“Nice to meet you, I’m Lucas!”

“Hi I’m Jungwoo!”

“I’m Winwin.”

“Nice to finally meet you, sunbae! I’m Kun!”

“And I’m Renjun!”

They shortly introduced themselves, you smiled. Trying to make sure you would remember their names if ever something happens.

You all talked together for a while, some had to already go after being called by their stylist so you were left alone with Doyoung to chat.

\

“You already have a boyfriend?!” Doyoung asked, quite shocked with what you had said. The two of you were seated in the cafeteria, Doyoung insisted on buying you food which you shyly agreed to. Your conversation had ended up with talking about your love life.

“Yeah. In fact, he’s a great guy.” You stated with a smile. Your mind wandering off to earlier that day when Vernon made you breakfast in bed.

“He must be so lucky to have you. I’m happy for the both of you but, what did your company say about the two of you dating?” Doyoung asked, taking a sip from his iced americano.

“Nothing, really. They just told us to keep it lowkey in public.” You replied with a shrug, drinking water from your bottle.

“That must’ve been nice.” Doyoung stated, eating his sandwich.

“Y/N!” Someone from behind you called. You happened to recognize the voice as it was a member of seventeen. It was Seungcheol.

“We thought you got kidnapped.” He joked, standing beside you as you ate the last of your salad.

“Sorry, it’s been a while since I last met them and we wanted to catch up.” You motion to Doyoung, who bowed to Seungcheol who had debuted first.

“Well, guess it’s time to say goodbye. You have my number already so let’s keep in touch?” Doyoung smiled at you, and you waved back at him nodding.

“Of course! Bye Doyoung~” you said your goodbye and the two of you went your separate ways just after cleaning the table you used.

You and Seungcheol walked over to your waiting room. Him asking about what did you talk about and all that, you answered all of the questions he threw at you. Finally, you arrived at your waiting room.

“You’re back!” Your co-member, Yoojin stated the obvious. Standing up to greet you.

“So… what happened?” She asked with a grin, excited to hear about your talk with the nct boys.

“Just talked about random stuff. Say, where’s Vernon?” You asked, looking around the room. Vernon wasn’t there.

“Oh, right. He wanted the two of you to go back to the dorms to get some rest before the dinner later on. He’s probably waiting for you by the entrance.” Seungcheol said.

“Okay, I guess I shouldn’t make him wait any longer. Bye guys!” You greeted, taking your belongings and ran towards the entrance to meet your boyfriend. Something must’ve happened for him to want the two of you to head home early. Usually he’d want to stay with the rest of your and his members. Though, alone time with your boyfriend wouldn’t be bad.

You saw Vernon by the entrance, you called for him and he smiled, taking a hold of your hand. Kissing your cheek before walking over to his manager’s car without another word.

“Is something wrong, Sol?” You asked after getting in the car. His manager sat on the drivers seat and started driving back to the dorms. Vernon shook his head.

“It’s nothing, I just figured you would be tired so let’s get back to the dorms to get some rest okay?” He pecked your lips, giving you a cute smile before holding you by your waist bringing you closer to him. Laying your head on his shoulder and he laid his head on top of yours.

Though, what Vernon said was a lie. He wasn’t going to let you rest . After what you’d gotten him into, the only way he could release his jealously without admitting it was through sex.

Once you gotten back to seventeen’s dorms, Vernon helped you carry your bags to his room. Luckily you only had your two backpacks. One for your personal belongings and the other for your outfit, mics and earpiece.

You and Vernon settled your stuff on the floor beside his bed. Vernon took a seat on his bed. Watching you lay beside him with your body sprawled across the bed. As if you were asking him to do it.

“Sol,” You called him, turning your head to meet his gaze that was eyeing you up and down. Making you feel embarrassed of yourself for looking so tired in front of your boyfriend. You tried to sit up next to him but Vernon pinned you back down on the bed. Tickling your sides which made you squirm and giggle while trying to pry off his hands on you.

“Vernon!” You scolded in between giggles. Vernon replied with an innocent ‘yes’, a loving smile spreads across his lips while continuing what he was doing.

After numerous attempts of making him stop (those ranged from the regular holding him off to biting his arm playfully), he finally gave in to your pleads and lied on the bed next to you.

“Okay, seriously. What do you want?” You asked after taking a moment to catch your breath. Vernon grabbed you by the waist and made you lay on top of him. Luckily, you weren’t that heavy for him to handle.

“Can we? It’s been a while..” He shyly asks. You knew exactly what he was implying. It was true that it had been a while since the two of you did it. You would be lying if you said that you weren’t dreading to do it again anytime soon. Even if the growing wants to have each other, none of you had the guts to talk about it with the other.

“I’m fine with that.” You replied, kissing his cheek to reassure him that you want it too. Vernon held you close to his chest, twirling a few strands of your hair in his finger and kissed your forehead.

Whenever you both had sex, Vernon was usually soft. He hated to break you, but a part of him wants you to feel that he can break you when he wants to as well.

Vernon kept the two of you in that position for a while. Just then, Vernon’s mind started to wonder back to the time when your co-members said that you were hanging out with the nct members earlier. It triggered his feelings, making him tightened his grip on your hair lightly pulling on it.

“Tell me, you and Doyoung?” He asked, naming one of the NCT members who you’d constantly talk about.

You weren’t sure why Vernon was talking about someone else when you’d both be having sex. That was when it clicked in. He was jealous.

“We’re just friends.” You stated, moaning lightly at how he pulled on your hair.

“Of course I know that. You’re mine, right baby? Say whose are you.” Vernon whispered in your ear. His hands wandering lower to remove your button up purple ruffle top.

“Yes, I’m yours Vernon.” You replied. You could already feel yourself getting wetter by how his hands roam freely on your skin after exposing your top.

Vernon smirked in satisfaction after hearing your words. It was great how you’d boost his pride without hesitation. He sat up on the bed with you sitting on his lap facing him. Your top and bra thrown on the floor to be forgotten. Vernon took one of your breasts in his mouth, lightly bitting on your nipple making your breathing hitch at the sudden feeling. His hand held the other breast, massaging it.

You held onto Vernon’s shoulders for support while he attacked your breasts without mercy, and he wasn’t going to leave your lower part without being given attention.

Vernon took your other breast in his mouth, being more rough. Leaving purple marks around your nipple and bit down on your nipple harder making you moan out his name out loud. “That’s right baby. Let them know whose making you feel this good.” He paused to suck in your moans and kiss you deeply, messy and full of tongue.

While the two of you were kissing, Vernon held your hips down to grind you on his member who was hard in his pants. You didn’t know that you could be more wet than now until you felt a tent in your boyfriend’s pants.

“Shorts off.” He demanded, breaking the kiss and made you whine from the loss of contact. But you obeyed him nonetheless. Removing your shorts and panties, throwing them to the side. Vernon doing the same and took off his pants and underwear to free his member. He watched you get back on the bed, completely naked for him. Vernon was on his knees, just in front of you. Pushing you back to lay down on the pillows as he pumped his member a few times.

“Do you need help, baby? Are you already wet? Why aren’t you saying anything?” Vernon whispered in your ear, biting lightly on your jaw. Then on your neck, shoulder blades and breasts. You moaned as his hot breath tickled your skin, how he’s ruining you already. Though you wanted more, you wanted him to touch you in other places.

“Vernon, please help me. I- ah!” You weren’t able to finish your sentence, getting cut off by Vernon attacking, biting down lower. He was now targeting your clit. His hands spreading open your legs and his lips wrapped around your little bundle of nerves. He wasn’t gentle, he held up your thigh to spank your ass.

“What did you say babe? What do you need help with?” He asked while his face only centimeters apart from your core and clit. When he spoke, his hot breathe made contact with your core and made you whimper in anticipation.

“Please fuck me Vernon, I need you.” You tried to say as you were getting close to your orgasm just from his mouth. What more if he filled you with his cock.

Vernon licked a few more stripes up your core before replacing his tongue with his two fingers. Dipping them in your juices before filling you inside. Making you moan his name out loud. Luckily no one was at the dorm right now, you hoped.

You tugged harder onto the locks of Vernon’s messy hair as you felt a knot in your stomach tightening. Just as you told him the words that you were gonna come, he stops. Sitting up nicely in front of you with a grin.

“Vernon what the-” You though he was done with you, but no he wasn’t. Vernon stroked his member before positioning it at your entrance. He wasted no time, too impatient now and pounded into you relentlessly.

“You like this huh? How I touch all of your sweet spots and exploring your pussy?” He dirty talks in your ear, leaning in to plant a kiss on your lips to capture your moans in his mouth. You nodded, moaning his name in a higher pitch. It felt so good.

“Please don’t stop.” You pleaded, hopefully he will allow you to cum. He chuckles and pounded into you harder. “Only for you, baby.”

It went on like that for a while, chasing both your orgasms. Vernon was already close, but he restricted himself to make you cum first in which you did not long after, his release followed yours.

Vernon collapsed next to you, hugging you close to him as you take in his release. His cum slowly dripping out of you.

“Sorry, I’ll help you with that.” Vernon said, taking a few tissues from the bedside and cleaned you up. You smiled at his sweet gesture, still exhausted from your session with him.

“You wanted to have sex because you were jealous, right?” You asked, a giggle following your words and Vernon shook his head, burying his face in your chest.

“Of course not! I just miss being this close to you, yeah, that’s why.” He reasoned out. You held him closer to you while taking the blankets to drape over your bodies.

“So, round two?”

[rhetoricandlogic]

Everyday Magic: Foundryside by Robert Jackson Bennett

Martin Cahill

Mon Aug 20, 2018 1:00pm

If there’s one thing I’ve learned reading Robert Jackson Bennett, it’s that when you think you know what he’s going to do at any given moment, you’re most likely going to be wrong. You think he’ll go right; he goes left. You think he’s going to climb a fence, and instead he barrels right through. Most often, when he hits a dead end and you suspect this is where you catch him, he grins, steps onto the empty air and begins to walk into the sky.

And in his latest novel, Foundryside, Bennett is firing on all cylinders, taking what at first seems to be something a little standard, a little rote, and infusing exhilarating new life into it through expert writing, complicated and distinct characters, and an intriguing, deadly, wonderful new city called Tevanne, where reality can be shuffled like a deck of cards, provided you can justify it.

See, in Tevanne, there exists a form of magic called scriving. Utilizing a complicated alphabet left behind by ancient, almost mythological figures called the Hierophants, mankind has figured out how to imbue everyday objects with something akin to sentience and convince these objects to do work for them. Some scrivings can convince wheels to move across flat surfaces as though they were rolling downhill. Others tell a sword that it is as sharp as ten blades in one, capable of cutting through nearly anything. Others tell a candle that it can never burn out. And in this world of scrivings, the four major Merchant Houses all vie for dominance in their enormous campuses, while outside of them, people like Sancia Grado cobble together enough to survive.

At least Sancia has a unique skillset: she’s a thief of high regard, and she’s damn good at what she does. Foundryside starts with her breaking into the docks of the Merchant Houses and working to steal something for what seems like a client in one of the rival houses. But what she finds inside is unlike anything she’s ever seen. A golden key of incredible power, and its own unique personality, one could say. Unsure of letting it fall into the hands of a House, even her client, Sancia stumbles into a plot years in the making, which could spell disaster for everybody in the city, if not the world. She’s going to have to use her own special abilities, the key around her neck, and anyone willing to help a thief from Foundryside, to stop it.

While on the surface this seems like a story we’ve seen before, Foundryside is immediately infused with Bennett’s eye for unique systems of magic, what makes people complicated beyond just being good or bad, and a city that has been pushed so far past being a capitalist dystopia, it’s a wonder it’s still functional. Sancia has what is essentially an invisible, chronic illness that only gets worse the more she pushes herself. She steals to make enough money to survive, and this latest operation can maybe get her enough to see if her illness can be treated. She runs through the maze that is Tevanne at a careful speed, never above causing destruction to get what she needs, but also trying very hard not to get anyone killed in the process. She’s a loner by necessity and by choice, though from the minute she finds this golden key, Bennett begins to challenge not only everything she knows, but everything she has come to learn and think about herself. She must ask for help. She must try to do the right thing. She must stay and fight. The success of Foundryside can be found in the slow way Bennett peels back Sancia’s character, revealing hidden layers and a history of pain, oppression, and violence that she tries to hide from everyone, even herself. While saying more would potentially spoil some things, the central message of Sancia’s character arc is one I should’ve seen coming, didn’t, and was devastated to read, finally realizing Bennett’s goals for her. Sancia’s journey is wonderful to watch, and her potential narrative paths for the sequel are fascinating. I can’t wait to see where Bennett takes her.

Bennett’s depth of character doesn’t just begin and end with Sancia, though. Tevanne and the entirety of Foundryside is populated with rich, complex people, like Gregor Dandolo, son of a Merchant House matriarch who seeks justice in a city that would sooner ignore crime than fight to stop it. Or Orso Ignacio, the Dandolo Hypatus, who fled one Merchant House for another, who struggles to unlock the mysteries of the Hierophants along with his scriving assistant Berenice, whose mind is even faster and sharper than his own. There’s Estelle Candiano, sold off daughter of a House Merchant lord, whose history with Orso is complicated, and whose scriving talents are ignored because she’s a woman in a city run by foolish men. And then there’s Clef. But the less said about him, the better; I’ll simply say he’s one of my favorites in the novel, for obvious reasons. Foundryside lives and dies on its characters, and Bennett’s novel more than thrives with the people he focuses on.

Foundryside is an excellent first novel in what promises to be another home-run series for Bennett. His characters are smart and engaging, his world is complex and dark though not without hope, and his story packs a punch, especially as we rocket toward the sequel in the closing pages. If you’ve never read any of his work, or worried it may not be your thing, trust me: Foundryside is your thing, and you’re going to enjoy your time here. Just keep watch out for any scrivings. Those things really do turn up in the darnedest places.