#any which way it's a huge bummer. and it's gonna make some games like entirely unplayable actually

[moe-broey]

At the risk of revealing I know very little about things in general, I really don't understand why Nintendo is shutting down online support for the 3DS/Wii U? Or that like, they can even Do That? Cause like, to me it makes sense that they'd have control and the say-so on the eShop, that's like, something they run as a company and Yes it absolutely sucks ass they nuked it for profit but like. Idk if I'll even phrase this right LMFAO but it seems like something they run themselves so it makes sense that they have complete authority over it. It's in their jurisdiction.

But like??? In my mind, if you have A Device that can connect to the internet it just. Should? Like I don't need a phone plan/data to use my old phone as a Youtube running device, as long as I'm connected to the internet. Like, the internet is a third party almost, one that you pay for personally and separately from any device you can use it with. I don't understand how Nintendo can intersect that and cut it off for their devices, specifically. Like, even if they have servers??? Idk how any of that works tbh I was just under the impression that if you have a device that you own and internet access. It's just those two things. Maybe it gets more complicated when it comes to games like Splatoon, but still....

[malicedafirenze]

I unintentionally skipped a lot of the romance content in Baldur's Gate 3 and I want others to learn from my mistakes:

So: I managed to lock myself out of romance entirely and ended up alone, which was a huge bummer and a serious crack in my motivation to play the game. I finished my playthrough (because I was already close to the end of Act 3 when I realized it), and plan to do another one eventually. I'm making this post in hopes of a) keeping others from making the same mistakes and b) to possibly get some additional insight re. what to watch out for in my next playthrough.

PSA: Pick a Partner before Act 3

The key learning here for me was this explanation from the poly mod

In BG3, romance is divided into 2 steps: dating and relationship(also called partner). Dating is basically where you are at after the 1st romance scene. Relationship is where you are at after the 2nd romance scene (relationship also unlocks the kissing menu). BTW, If you enter A3, all dates will break up with you (partners won't, ofc).

I hadn't realized this until well into Act 3, at a point where going back to a save to properly fix it would have meant replaying large parts of Act 2 as well - I decided to finish my run instead and then start a completely new one later.

Note: lots of spoilers below. (click here to read this post on reddit instead)

My Romance Woes

I read in advance that you couldn't romance multiple people (except for the specific Halsin combos with Shadowheart and Astarion) and therefore turned down Gale and Lae'Zel early in the game (not realizing you could just date/bonk them without fully committing or getting anyone upset)

I didn't take approval all that seriously, thought I'd have more opportunity to fix things later. I was playing pretty good guy, and ended up with high approval for Karlach and Shadowheart, but low for Astarion. Weirdly, I don't recall an option to romance Shadowheart (no clue what I missed?) and the only option I had for Karlach was at the Tiefling party, where I went with Astarion instead. I had a scene or two with him, but then didn't progress further in the relationship, without really realizing what I was missing.

I wanted to romance everyone, sat on the fence for too long, and ended up not romancing anyone at all, by missing a thing or two in act 1 and 2 and being too late to fix it in act 3. Don't be like me, it feels bad man.

Early Act 3, I got Astarion's breakup dialogue ("we haven't spent a night together in some time" --> him explaining it was just transactional and he doesn't see the value in it anymore) and got super worried, but when trying to look up if I'd messed up, I didn't find a clear answer for without more spoilers, so I just continued playing Act 3, including all of the companion quests.

I later learned that I missed out on at least one important Astarion romance interaction by not going to Moonrise Towers until after freeing Nightsong. (when the Towers are already on high alert, i.e. I could only fight and not have a lot of conversations)

After realizing I had messed up companions romance, I instead fucked everyone it was unwise to fuck (Emperor, Mizora, Harleep...) for fun and to see what would happen... but chickened out and reloaded after Emperor and Mizora. Still, got to enjoy some fun content that way!

The ending I got (going to Avernus with Karlach) was really cool and made me cry a lot. I then did try to reload my last save though, to see if I'd get any other epilogue content if I didn't go to the Hells, but... apparently that scene on the docks (Astarion goofily running off, everyone kinda agreeing to go party after this, no other conversations with anyone again.... is just... it?

Idk how much of this is the lack of romance, but I really felt like something was missing there. I at least wanted to talk to everyone again one last time.

This is a post about my romance failures and regrets so I'm not gonna talk about everything else that I loved about the game, but just in case this is getting a bit too negative: I had an absolute blast with the whole game regardless, I'm stoked to give it another go the "proper" way (i.e. with romance). I also generally think it's really fucking cool that this game's romance options depend on how you behave, and that you can't just e.g. give someone the right kind of gift 20 times in a row to make them love you, like it works in games like Stardew Valley.

Next Playthrough Plans

I'll probably wait for another patch or two - considering how much got fixed and tweaked with the first three patches, I suppose it's worth to wait a bit and see what's coming

I'll play with the Poly mod next time and try to romance all of the Origin characters.

I plan to play with the camp notifications mod, as well as the approval ratings in dialogue mod. Both in hopes of being able to game the romance a bit better and get much of the romance in one playthrough

I'll play Dark Urge (haven't seen any of that so far!), but probably still go for a "good" playthrough mostly

I plan on equipping & levelling all Origin companions and switch them out more freely, in order to get approval from everyone and edit my party as makes sense depending on story events (e.g. take Lae'Zel to the Creche, take Gale to the Ketheric fight...)

I want to romance everyone. I already saw some tips for early game Astarion approval and assume the aforementioned mods will help in optimizing this

Am probably not gonna do anything all that differently otherwise because my heart can't take an actually evil playthrough

Aand that's about it. As mentioned, I'm mostly posting in case this helps anyone else.

I was really damn sad when I realized I had locked myself out of all romance, because the romance was a significant part of my motivation to start playing this in the first place. At the same time, I loved so much about the game that I still got a lot out of it in 110+ hours even with minimal romance content.

If you see any red flags about my plans for the next playthrough (or if you have experience with the mentioned mods!), I'd appreciate comments and insights. Other than that, here's hoping others can learn from my mistakes. Thank you for reading <3

[johannesviii]

Top 10 Personal Favorite Hit Songs from 2020

You know, when I finished my latest list and realised every decade had the same pattern and that we were slowly going towards a series of great years for pop, I didn’t realise how good that year would be.

What’s at the top? Am I boringly predictable because I already said I loved that song all the way back in January 2020? Let’s find out.

Disclaimers:

Keep in mind I’m using both the year-end top 100 lists from the US and from France while making these top 10 things. There’s songs in English that charted in my country way higher than they did in their home countries, or even earlier or later, so that might get surprising at times.

Of course there will probably be stuff in French somewhere on this post. We suck. I know. It’s my list. Deal with it.

My musical tastes have always been terrible and I’m not a critic, just a listener and an idiot.

I have sound to color synesthesia which justifies nothing but might explain why I have trouble describing some songs in other terms than visual ones.

So. Uh. How was your 2020?

Mine was actually surprisingly good, considering. I’m lucky enough to have a job that I can partially do from home, and I was extremely paranoid from the get-go and nobody got sick under this roof so far. Turns out I’m even better at my job from home and I got permission to work from home one day per week even after the health crisis is over! My first name was also finally officially approved and I can’t tell you how happy I feel about that. I almost feel bad to have had such a good year considering the circumstances. I feel like an asshole just because I’m happy, haha.

The only frustrating part was that I was supposed to see Hatari in concert in Paris in early April which, as you can guess, was cancelled. I’m not too mad about it though, since their tour was called “Europe will crumble” and the message saying the tour was cancelled started with “since Europe is actually crumbling due to Covid-19″ and that’s hysterical.

Good or interesting albums that came out in 2020 now, let’s see.

Nightwish released Human/Nature, which was a huge letdown compared to their previous album, but I will relisten to it at some point to make sure I wasn’t just in a bad mood that day.

The Birthday Massacre released Diamonds, which might be their weakest album since their debut, but contained some real gems (I listened to The Last Goodbye on a loop, it floored me. Flashback and Enter are also very good).

The 1975 released Notes On A Conditional Form, and let’s be real, it’s a f█cking mess. You could cut half the tracks and end up with an excellent album, but as it is it’s like, yes, a collection of notes ; however there’s some truely excellent shit on it (see unelligible songs).

Thanks to a friend on a discord server I was exposed to Dorian Electra’s music and I haven’t been quite the same ever since. I’m so happy to be alive to see other enbies making such great music with an insanely good aesthetic surrounding it and asking so many interesting questions about gender. Also the arc the ‘gentleman’ character goes through over the course of the entire tracklist of the 2020 My Agenda album is absolutely hilarious, don’t @ me.

I also discovered 100 Gecs this year. Why are most of you guys saying it’s unlistenable garbage. It’s just as abrasive and over the top as industrial music is, but with none of the edginess or drama. I love it. What the hell. But yeah Tree of Clues was released this year. Good.

Speaking of industrial, in March 2020 Nine Inch Nails were like “hey remember when we released Ghosts I-IV a decade ago entirely for free and how amazing that was? Well we’re all in lockdown and bored as hell so here’s Ghosts V-VI and it’s also free. Enjoy” and I f█cking died instantly. And it’s even better than I-IV. What the hell was that year

Jonsi released Shiver. It’s strange and highly experimental. I’m pretty sure it’s a good thing I was into hyperpop this year, otherwise going from his previous material straight to this album would have been brutal.

Yadda yadda yadda After Hours by the Weeknd good yadda yadda.

I’ve joked about that already but if you had told me in 2019 that 2020 would have fires, a pandemic, riots, monoliths appearing and disappearing, and also a super good Machine Gun Kelly album, guess which part I would have found the most ridiculous. But yeah uh. Tickets to my Downfall good

So uh this year I tried to listen to some hyperpop and liked it a lot, and I also dipped my toes timidly into screamo and listened to Svalbard, who released When I Die this year, and the entire album was a very beautiful, very intricately decorated punch to the face. It sounds like God Is An Astronaut except with a shit ton of yelling. I love it. Open Wound is my favorite track on it.

But no, despite all of this, my album of the year was from a band I had never even heard about before that year, called Spanish Love Songs. The album is titled Brave Faces Everyone and it’s line after line after line of extremely relatable generational angst but yelled with complete sincerity and it’s so propulsive and energetic you can’t help but feel both exhausted and ready to fight the entire universe. I don’t know how it works, but it’s incredible. The entire album is wonderfully brutal, so it’s kind of difficult to pick my favorite songs on it, but Beachfront Property and the title track stand out.

Unelligible songs, now, and there’s, uh, quite a few of them too so I’m also gonna use bullet points. Good lord this post is gonna be long.

First, let me say I have literally no idea why Midnight Sky by Miley Cyrus wasn’t a bigger hit. It’s not on the year-end US top 100 and it feels extremely wrong. Would have made it to #4 on this list otherwise.

I still entertain the vague hope that stuff from Machine Gun Kelly will chart higher in 2021 but I doubt it will happen so I might as well tackle it now and say that Bloody Valentine and especially Forget Me Too are both excellent and that it’s a shame radios aren’t playing them more often.

Heaven by the late Avicii featuring Coldplay should have charted in 2019 and still didn’t chart in 2020 and that’s a real shame.

If the world was a bit less unfair, Lovesick Girls by Blackpink would have been a hit rather than the awful Ice Cream.

One day I will stop complaining about my bafflement concerning the lack of mainstream pop charts success of The 1975. Today is not that day. I just love how they keep making songs about extremely awkward relationships full of weird details, and I haven’t grown tired of that yet. So yeah If You’re Too Shy is about a guy who’s crush is asking him to get naked on Skype in his hotel room and he’s, uh, not too sure about that idea.

And Me & You Together is about a guy who never finds the right moment to tell his best friend he’s in love with her, and he manages to do so at the end and it’s cute as hell. My fave part is “I'm sorry that I'm kinda queer / It's not as weird as it appears / It's 'cause my body doesn't stop me (Stop me) / Oh, it's okay, lots of people think I'm gay / But we're friends, so it's cool, why would it not be?”. Relatable as f█ck.

And now for an international hit that should have been bigger in the US and/or in my country but wasn’t: Head & Heart by Joel Corry and MNEK.

I’ve heard Nos Célébrations by Indochine extremely often on French radio for months now so I was very surprised to see that it didn’t crack the local year-end list. What happened.

I can finally hear the appeal of Bring Me The Horizon. It took me ages. And also Death Stranding. The song Ludens isn’t in the game per say, but it’s among the ones you can pick to broadcast briefly when people drive by your constructions, and long story short it's been living rent-free in my head for months now.

Phew.

It’s time for a round of Honorable Mentions for elligible songs, containing a couple of guilty pleasures, which is saying something considering the kind of shit I put on some of my previous lists.

Ne Reviens Pas (Gradur et Heuss l’Enfoiré) - Heuss is a French artist that kept baffling me while making my lists for the previous years, and I was like “??? ok, that’s it then, I guess I’m getting too old to get what teenagers find funny”. This one worked for me, though. And the music video doesn’t hurt. Really dumb and really fun.

Adore You (Harry Styles) - Perfectly good little pop song, very pleasant to listen to, never outstayed its welcome for me.

Mood (24kGoldn) - This doesn’t sound like a very good relationship, my dude, but that’s still a super pleasant song.

WAP (Cardi B & Megan Thee Stallion) - This song is absolutely hilarious and I will hear no argument from any of you.

Control (Zoe Wees) - Was clearly a hit here. Should have been even bigger though. What a powerful but comfy voice. If I had better taste it would be on the list.

Hot Girl Bummer (Blackbear) - I. Uh. Listen. I keep saying I have bad taste and nobody believes me. Do you believe me now. But yeah. “F█ck you, and you, and you~, I hate your friends and they hate me too” is gonna pop in my head every single time someone is being a jerk anywhere near me now. It’s been happening all year already. Someone trashed my documents at work? Someone isn’t wearing a mask in public? That guy has filled his car with rolls of toilet paper? Brain goes “F█ck you, and you, and you~”. Every. Single. Time.

Come & Go (Juice WRLD & Marshmello ) - Damn, that’s a pretty good little song. I’ve seen plenty of people saying it’s ruined by the drop, but may I remind you I’m the person who loves Blue by Eiffel 65 with all my heart. If the song was ramping up consistently until the end instead of ending like that, it would have made the list, definitely.

And now, the actual list. This one actually feels pretty solid, I genuinely like everything on it, there’s no filler here for once.

10 - The Box (Roddy Rich)

US: #3 / FR: #23

Now this is a weird case, because for the longest time I couldn’t figure out why this song was so popular and I was completely neutral about it. Then, one morning in September, my mental jukebox (which always, always puts a song on a loop in my head when I wake up) decided to play it. And I was like oh wow?? I never noticed the atmosphere in that song before? It’s so great. And that hook too. Let’s listen to it.

So yeah, I don’t know what happened. It just clicked one day and everything fell into place, I guess.

9 - Alane (Wes & Robin Shulz)

US: Not on the list / FR: #93

Come on. You can’t do a remake of one of my previous #1 songs and let it chart in 2020. That’s cheating. Even with this subpar drop, I have to put it on the list, now.

I’ve already said my piece about the original, so I’m just going to send you back to my 1997 list.

8 - Kings and Queens (Ava Max)

US: Not on the list / FR: #76

[BBC documentary voice] After Lady Gaga decided to make piano balads and left her musical niche vacant, Ava Max quickly took her place as the top predator pop diva. Even after Lady Gaga was re-introduced to her natural habitat in 2020, she still hasn’t fully recovered in Europe, where Ava Max still reigns supreme on the charts -

(tldr I think it’s hilarious that this isn’t on the US Billboard while Lady Gaga isn’t on the French year-end top 100)

7 - Roses (Saint Jhn & Imanbek)

US: #19 / FR: #3

What an earworm. It doesn’t even bother trying to have an intro or an outro, so it loops almost perfectly. It’s like entering a party that started long before you arrived, and it will go on long after you leave it to go back home. Kind of hypnotic in a way.

And yes, my mental jukebox was very fond of using it to wake me up this year, so this is another song that’s here almost solely because of that.

6 - Physical (Dua Lipa)

US: Not on the list / FR: #69 (hehehe)

“Hey I’m not that old” says the guy who’s definitely a sucker for this kind of retro throwback that was so popular this year. Oh well.

I don’t have anything interesting to say about this one, though. Apart from the fact that everyone seems to have a different fave song on that album. Guess that’s quality for you.

5 - Rain on Me (Lady Gaga & Ariana Grande)

US: #48 / FR: Not on the list

That is far from being Lady Gaga’s best song, but it was a joy to listen to everytime it was on the radio anyway. Also Ariana Grande has surprisingly good chemistry with Gaga! This year was full of strange duets mostly made for commercial reasons, and this one isn’t an exception, but unlike a lot of them, it really, really works.

4 - Dynamite (BTS)

US: #38 / FR: Not on the list

I’m still not 100% sold on k-pop even if a ton of it sounds super good, but come on. Even if some bits of this song (especially the beginning of the second chorus) sound a bit like they were made on autopilot, it still sounds just as happy and fun several months after I first heard it and I never got tired of it. That’s quality. You hear it and you can’t help but tap your feet and smile.

Actually, I’m sure there’s people somewhere that don’t smile when they hear this song. And they must be avoided at all costs.

3 - Godzilla (Eminem ft Juice WRLD)

US: #62 / FR: Not on the list

What are you doing so high on this list, old man. Why are you still here in the year 2020. I thought we left you in the previous decade. Who gave you the right.

I’m gonna tell you who did, and it’s actually Juice WRLD. Because that chorus is incredible, and like a lot of people I’m pissed off because the guy died super young and this shit shouldn’t happen to anybody. No, his early material wasn’t great, but I’m sorry I’m gonna say it again: have you heard this damn chorus? It’s suspenseful and dark, it’s got this lowkey menacing quality, it’s an earworm and a half, and it’s more convincing in like six lines than Eminem’s own flexing is in the entire song.

The beat is extremely good as well, and the flow, obviously, impressive. The weakest link is Eminem’s writing, which is as usual full of puns and weird wordplay, except here a lot of it isn’t great, and that last ultra fast part at the end is technically impressive but it also drives the song up a cliff and stops it dead in its tracks once it’s over. But frankly the lines fly by so fast it’s difficult to be too annoyed by them.

Can I sincerely put this extremely flawed song so high on my list? A better question would be “did I spend hours trying to learn how to sing this shit without choking on my own spit?”. The answer is yes. To both.

2 - Heartless (The Weeknd)

US: #28 / FR: Not on the list

I’ve said it on my 2015 and 2016 lists already, but just for the record I’ll say it again: it took me ages to like The Weeknd, mostly because I found most of his songs fairly boring, or disliked the lyrics, or both. Also I never really liked the general vibe of his “sexy” songs like The Hills, they felt dark but in an unpleasant creepy way. Felt like miserable hedonism, if that makes sense.

So, because I’m a person with extremely consistent and logical tastes, here’s the exact same shit he was making before, except that this time I absolutely adore it.

What is he doing differently that makes the whole After Hours album click for me whereas almost all of his previous material failed to do so? Is it the energy? Is it the reverb? Is it the fact that the narrator sounds properly unhinged and, frankly, scared to be spiralling out of control? Why are the colors so beautiful yet full of anxiety? Why is that bridge so fantastic? How can you make your voice look like a glowstick in the dark?

I give up. I have no clue. At least I’m done talking about-

Oh.

1 - Blinding Lights (The Weeknd)

US: #1 / FR: #1 (listen sometimes something’s just that good, ok)

Surprise. Or not.

Wow, look at that, Johannes has put this year’s number one pop song at number one on their personal playlist. The audacity. The edge. What a hot take.

I discovered that song when it first came out at the end of 2019 and I adored it instantly. And I was so scared it wouldn’t be a hit. Which means I’m a f█cking dumbass considering it ended up breaking all sorts of records in 2020. But what can I say, overplay can be a blessing when you love a song that much.

Like every single song I put at number one on one of my lists, I will draw this one at some point and you will understand how incredibly satisfying it is to listen to a song called Blinding Lights, talking about city lights looking blurry when you’re driving at night, while looking itself like a bunch of blurry city lights passing by super fast. Perfect in every way.

Also it sounds exactly like A-ha, and that never hurts.

See you next year! Pretty sure it will be even better music-wise.

[sugarhillpark]

I was tagged by @pyrchance. Thanks Pyr and I’ll try to repay you for these ask tags by getting a more Pretty. Odd. looking cake one day. 💕

1. why did you choose your url?

I didn’t wanna pick something for one fandom because I jump around (turned out to be wise). I ended up going with a variation on one of my favourite childhood haunts near my grandparents’ house that wasn’t too identifying because both place names are varied (the actual place name was taken anyway).

2. any side blogs? if you have them, name them and why you have them.

Nup. Maybe one day. Right now I like being impressed by the commitment of anyone who follows me to putting up with all the reblogged pictures that have absolutely fuck all to do with what they wanted from me.

3. how long have you been on tumblr?

I had two other tumblrs in my twenties but with I think possibly years long gaps between them? The first one was in my mid twenties sometime? Probably? So like anything up to 8 years on and off. Feeling very (Owen Wilson voice) ‘wow’ now.

4. do you have a queue tag?

No but I have OCD and organise pictures in a way that probably only makes sense to me.

5. why did you start your blog in the first place?

I wanted to get back into writing fanfic and fandom because I was struggling with original work and missed the engagement in these spaces. And honestly the thirst posts and memes.

6. why did you choose your icon/pfp?

It’s a sketch one of my favourite people @tinylittletext did for me of a little scorpion with a bleeding heart flower, two things I freaking love! Very enamoured with this lil guy and will probably get some variation of this tattooed on me eventually.

7. why did you choose your header?

Uh yeah I still haven’t got to that yet.

8. how many mutuals do you have?

I haven’t counted and I’m not gonna but I love you guys.

9. how many followers do you have?

Under 100 (look, I’m a new to the fandom freak who isn’t very intriguing and I love that about me)

10. how many people do you follow?

Also under 100 because I tend to compulsively try to scroll through my entire dash most of the time but I’m working on it.

11. have you ever made a shitpost?

Uh I’m not sure how you grade shitposts but if I haven’t I aspire to?

12. how often do you use tumblr each day?

Plenty. I lose track. Probably scrolling 3-5 times depending on what I’m up to that day.

13. did you ever fight/argument with another blog once? who won?

Not on this tumblr baby. On an old tumblr some 1975 fandom people I guess tried to start drama with me when my fic got more popular than theirs but I just wanted to sit in my corner and not mess with that so it was just kind of them complaining within their small clique. It was still a bummer and made me lose interest in that fanfic and fandom though so I guess they won? Bandom has been pretty sweet so far because it’s such a huge fandom space I think people are less neurotic and territorial about stuff like fanfic and followers.

14. how do you feel about "you need to reblog this" posts?

Hard nope.

15. do you like tag games?

Yep, even if I always feel kind of like the kid being given like a cookie by the cool kids and I have zero fun lunchbox stuff to trade because all my mutuals who actually like doing these have usually already been tagged. 😅

16. do you like ask games?

Ditto.

17. which of your mutuals do you think is tumblr famous?

Tumblr famous sounds dark I’m not gonna drag my mutuals into that.

18. do you have a crush on a mutual?

I have writing crushes on @throwupsparkles and @pyrchance those guys are amazing. I have all these BBB fics to read as well so I’ll probably get more writing crushes mutual and otherwise.  Also obviously have a huge fucking crush on Tiny, she’s aware. 😚

Tagging @theyellowgrassgrows and @miss-bethany and please anyone who wants to do this say I tagged you and go nuts.

[steve0discusses]

Yugioh S4 Ep16: Rex and Weevil Do Not Understand “Rock Bottom”

Hey guys.

Hey.

So... kind of crazy out there, right?

Well, you know what they say. When life gives you lemons, you watch Netflix.

Anyway, Yugioh is racing down this canyon that should be going up alongside the 101 and through the middle of many cities. Don’t worry about it.

And then I found out the name of a card I haven’t seen yet and wow it’s a name.

I’m really glad that Rex Raptor, dinosaur enthusiast, has just no idea how to name dinosaurs and does so like a 6 year old child. Hornsaurus.

(read more under the cut)

So this episode is mostly about Rex and Weevil’s tragic backstory, and thankfully, it’s really not that tragic. We’ve had SO MANY bizarre and weird backstories under our belt, that to have a completely normal one is just...wild to me. They’re so freakin normal.

And on the way, our train just...

OK Train...anyway, I’ll do my best to show which scenes are flash back and which are not, but like bear with me because it flashes back like every other scene it feels like.

So Rex waxes long about that very short time in which he and Weevil were the best ever duelists in Japan (other than Kaiba, I guess, who they failed to mention in this flashback.)

(I used to have a very soft performance fleece sweater the exact same shade as Weevil’s jacket there, popped collar and everything, with piping outline. Don’t judge me, it was the 00′s, I’m just shocked that Weevil also shopped at Old Navy.)

(However I have no idea what’s going on with Rex’s three layers of clashing outfit styles that he has going on. A turtleneck under a thick button up jacket under an open fringe jacket is so much of a 90′s vibe.)

Up until now, bro has been PRETTY SURE every episode that Rex and Weevil are originally from America. I don’t know how I feel about being so right on the money about this one when the episode outright said that they’re from Japan. I don’t really want to out-Yugioh my brother, because at some point, I’ll accidentally let slip that in writing this blog I have accidentally gained all Yugioh knowledge, just like Noah did that one time when he was stuffed into that brain orb.

Just please don’t don’t ask me how this game works, I still have absolutely no idea.

Weevil and Rex had adoring fans in two-shaded polos exactly just like the type I used to wear in high school. But, their fans all left them the moment Weevil lost one single game against Yugi Muto.

Harsh. But granted, I feel like the people of Domino have rabbit memories and if you aren’t actively in the news every day because your blimp got abducted by sea pirates, then who the hell is EVER going to know who you are?

But youknow, Rex and Weevil are pretty sure that dodging getting murdered by Pegasus was actually their last shot at fame. It’s over forever. They’re done. Done until they beat either Joey or Yugi which...very specific, but, it would make you somewhat famous if you did that by simultaneously destroying the Caltrain.

And Weevil is like gunning for the King of Games title but...apparently no one in this episode wanted to mention to Weevil that the “King of Games” moniker actually went to Raphael?

That he needs to beat Raphael...not Yugi Muto?

Nobody?

Nobody feels like mentioning that neither Yami nor Yugi could possibly still be King of Games and that Weevil has no really good reason to be here? I mean it would save Weevil a lot of time. It would also save me a lot of time. We could just walk off this train and go back to what we were all doing before this happened, but nah, lets keep the lie going, because apparently Yami can’t bear to tell the truth, just like his host.

Waiiiit, isn’t Rebecca the King of Games because she beat Yugi in S1?

It’s the freakin Malfroy/Elder wand, it’ll be important in Ch 40 I’m sure of it. I’m sure they’re not going to just...forget...all of the people that beat Yugi before.

Man. Maybe that’s why Yugi is so hell bent on keeping tabs on Rebecca? Just to youknow...make sure she doesn’t tell anyone that she hella beat him that one time because otherwise Kaiba would have lost his freakin mind (again) that Yugi lost that title basically the same afternoon he came back from Pegasus’ island.

Also Rex and Weevil once charged for headshots and this makes them vile, terrible people for some reason.

Apparently this is a bad practice? I mean if you’re famous enough please charge for head shots, you need to make money between playing cards. Take it from this jaded artist, always sell out so you can save money for when you will absolutely get carpal tunnel.

Whatever. Back to Rex who is certain that he is not famous anymore because he lost to Joey.

S4 and still everyone is certain that Joey is bad at cards. Joey will just never be free from this.

It was beautiful anime food for like ten seconds until he did this. How dare. Literally though, how did he do that? Was that burger made out of potato chips?

Can we talk about what a freakin crime it is I can’t watch my Nick at Night retro shows on Netflix or Hulu? Like hell I’m going to get a third streaming service so I can watch and admire how bad “I Love Lucy” aged. I want to see how incredibly off-putting Fonzie is as an adult. But nah. Not even allowed. You can only watch Cheers.

Cheers. What am I? 65? Cheers wasn’t on Nick at Night. My Mom watched Cheers. Gross.

This show trying to convince me so hard that Rex and Weevils lowest point wasn’t when they were 5 seconds away from being set on fire and having their soul removed by Maxamillion Pegasus.

Like for reals, the lowest point for ANYONE (except for the Ishtars) on this show was when they were trapped on that island, without any camping supplies, surrounded by human skulls, Bakura pre-exorcism, and so many other duelists who were probably going to eat them had the tournament gone 24 more hours than it had.

The island that also had a basement that was entirely full of cultists who absolutely murdered a guy right in front of us.

Like when they finally got out of the island’s huge ass forest, their dinner included a soup filled with Pegasus’ eyes.

I would have gotten pissed on by like 70 stray dogs to get off that island, y’all.

So one of the best things about this blog is I don’t have to worry about the restraint of a.) looking professional b.) the fear of sharing my actual real deal opinion. Everywhere else I post, I can’t share anything. I’ve come to terms with this, and so I hide my hot takes deep, deep within this Yugioh blog and the only people who suspect my art rage are like...y’all in the corner of Tumblr who do not care about what I’m talking about.

++++++++++++THIS IS MY HUGE RANT ABOUT ART POLITICS AND ART BITTERNESS FEEL FREE TO SKIP THIS. WE’RE QUARANTINING SO MUCH OVER HERE DUE TO THE VIRUS THAT I AM GOING A LITTLE BIT HOUSE CRAZY+++++++++++++++

But like MAN I need to mention something. Both Joey and Rex are completely off base. Both of them.

Like I’ll be real, because of the sudden extra time I have on my hands, I was originally ranting quite a bit about art culture and stuff and I will admit it was projecting somewhat onto a TV show that was written before the recession and the gig economy basically came and laid a huge dump across the creative industry.

However, I really, really, really don’t like it when people naively say “I’m successful because I did the research, I did the work, and then I got a following despite doing no marketing at all,” LIKE HELL YOU DID, DUDE. And there’s certain places I go where this is the mantra of a hell ton of ppl who don’t believe in luck, and I have to just suck it in because they succeeded at a young age. Because inversely, if anyone doesn’t succeed right away--clearly they don’t work hard enough, right?

I won’t dig into real world stuff because that’s...the real world and the real world is a bummer, but even in the universe of Yugioh there’s this crazy disparity in duelers that the people on the top refuse to acknowledge and the people on the bottom have absolutely no way to cope with so they become insanely bitter about it.

Mai has mentioned that despite all of her hard work and success--because she isn’t the top 4 duelists of Kaiba’s tourney--no one knows who she freakin is. The card industry is so toxic, that even KAIBA dropped out.

And even without Kaiba to compete against anymore, Mai still wasn’t able to get in there to fill that void. The void that also has Marik and Odion in it, despite the fact that I’m pretty sure Marik will never touch a card ever again and might be back to living underground or on a boat in the middle of no-where. And we don’t even need to mention Bakura, right? Bakura who should have also been here to fill the void of fame, but his face probably only comes out fuzzy on camera like people haunted by that girl from the Ring. So we’ll just ignore Bakura, that makes sense, I can accept that canon.

But really...it’s just Joey and Yugi at the top of the crop when there should have been room for at least 4.

So, it’s interesting that the Oricalchos in this situation is the “get me popular quick” drug that will somehow give Rex and Weevil what they need for automatic success because I see people desperately looking for this SO MUCH online. I have seen so many post “This is how I got 100000 followers in 100 days,” and it’s always the same story that isn’t so much about hard work, but more how to game a broken system until all other competitors are invisible. And then there’s the hidden factor about...luck...that really offends people although we all know that it exists.

But just remember I’m not allowed to have this opinion that luck...exists...So if anyone asks, I never said this.

And also...if Rex and Weevil had any support up until now from these kids who have been stuffing them in the trunk for over a dozen episodes, they wouldn’t have done any of this.

So talking as a jaded Millennial, I’m not gonna judge you if you take your Oricalchos, if you know what I mean. Everyone has their reasons, and no one’s too good not to ever do it, lets be real.

+++++++++++++++END OF THIS RANT, WOW, I WANT TO SAY THAT WHILE SLAPPING A WHOLE LOT OF PEOPLE IN A GENTLE MANNER+++++++++++++

So I realized something. This cliff face is sort of an iconic train, but it’s the wrong train.

This is the Amtrak in the middle of Nevada/Utah, pretty sure. I know that shade of orange. I’ve done the Nevada drive a lot.

And part of the reason I’m even sleuthing into this is because as an artist I like to see where art inspiration comes from. It doesn’t just come from a void--they clearly did research and I just want to find out...how it happened.

So anyway, like I said last time, the Amtrak is in charge of the Caltrain management, although the Caltrain is not part of Amtrak. And so you get similar paint jobs--it’s just that Amtrak has blue topped cars, and the Caltrain cars are typically red. Yugioh safely did red, white and blue, which both cars do, to an extent, being American trains.

It’s possible that they decided to look up scenic trains in California and were like “this one looks neat.” This one is also named the “California Zephyr” which makes it seem super Californian but in actuality it goes from Emeryville, California to Chicago. Only problem is that Emeryville is North of Oakland, and we’re supposed to be taking the train “to the airport” when the airports are in Oakland or San Mateo. This train doesn’t go to the airport. You just drove by the airport.

This train also doesn’t go to Florida. Chicago is North, way north. This train exists to be a slow, scenic train for old tourists who want to sleep in cramped spaces or jaded millennials writing their award winning novel. It has no other purpose.

So, it doesn’t at all match anything story wise...but it looks cool. They would never take this train if the world was going to end, and Rebecca wouldn’t know it exists, but, it looks cool.

But anyway, onward to the next episode. I’ll be kind of bunking in my home for a while since my entire area basically shut down, so maybe I’ll get the next updates done earlier than usual? Maybe even catch up on my backlog? hm. Possibilities.

And if you just got here, this is all the Yugioh recaps in chrono order.

[spaceypeachbun]

Spicy Vento Aureo OC: Biscotti 'Bikky' Zhan

Not on any particular team, answers directly to Polpo and is, in very loose terms, his 'assistant'. Biscotti will assist other teams when needed, and never really asks for much in return besides that Hey Guys We Should Exchange Emails!!!!!! Are you on email? He is! and maybe that they play hackysack with him. Please for the love of God play hackysack with him he's JONESING for some hacky

He does not get to play very much hackysack. :(

24 in 2001, has been at this game since he was 17.

While Polpo is in his fancy custom jail cell, Biscotti lives in his old mansion, keeping the attendants in line and making sure they're paid, doing light administrative assistant work for Polpo, sweeping up the floors and dusting the art, and also bringing his boss things in jail. He's freakishly good at smuggling things, and this has nothing to do with his stand. Bikky is just good at hiding things.

His stand, however, is [HOUSE OF AIR], a classic air-manipulation power. He can make big gusts of air, control air currents around objects or people to make them float or fly (though this isn't very good for stealth because there tends to be a blustery sound and it'll make your hair stand up weird), that sort of thing. HOA's punchghost looks like if you made a pan flute into a robot, and then splattered watercolor paint all over it.

Biscotti is entirely deaf, and wears hearing aides. He tried to join the military, but they wouldn't let him be a soldier because of it, which was a huge bummer.

That's about all he'll share about his past, besides that he used to play a lot of soccer. Football, whatever, fucking Italy.

Anyway, he does have a hair of a deaf accent, though years and years of speech therapy has faded it, but please please don't point it out to him. He knows, and it tends to make him genuinely upset, and is also like, fucking rude??

Biscottis SUPER SECRET EXTRA JOB is to watch Black Sabbath. When he knows someone has been given the lighter, he'll stalk them until they inevitably try to relight it. Then he waits to see if the arrow chooses them. If they do, he usually says 'hooray!!' out loud, to himself, because he's so excited that there's gonna be a new person in Passione! Maybe they'll play hackysack with him :}!! When the arrow kills them he has to heave a sigh, put on his gloves, and take care of the body. Very not cool :{

Either way, he reports back to Polpo with the 411, so if you dropped your lighter before you even left the mansion, he knows because he was hiding in the ceiling and watching, and now Polpo knows too.

When Giorno dealt with that whole mess, what the audience missed was Bikky panicking, gripping his curly hair, and going "UH OH! UH OH! WHOOPS! OH NO! WHOOPS! UH--OH JEEZE!!" and then cleaning up Super Mario janitor (may he Rest In Peace) and running back to the prison freaking out because Polpo's Gonna Be So Mad!!! Biscotti was instructed to never intervene with Black Sabbath's choosing, so he doesn't, but this sometimes winds up making him panic. He's anxious.

Built like a dorito... wide shoulders.

[3monthsineurope]

June 12, 2021

Haley and I snoozed until 8-8:30 ish on Saturday morning. We were a little tired, since we didn’t go to bed until about 1, but we were gonna be okay! Most of our stuff was packed, so we spent the morning nibbling on any leftovers we had, doing our make up and getting dressed, and tidying up the apartment. We both really loved the Airbnb, I’m really glad we got to stay there!

Around 10:30, we called our Uber. We had all our bags, but what could we do about that! The Uber took us about ten minutes to get to Uptown, for our brunch at 5Church. Paige (the girl who lives in Charlotte) had recommended it for us. We had a reservation at 10:45, which worked out, because we needed to check out of our Airbnb by 11. Also, Haley and I (and Mom!) have matching Away bags, which is fun! We took our time at 5Church because we didn’t have plans for anything afterwards, besides heading to the airport. The entire waitstaff at 5Church was soooooo kind and nice! Our host asked if we were celebrating anything and I told him Haley’s birthday (only a month early, hahah). He offered us a free dessert! The first thing we ordered was a mimosa flight each! The flavors were orange, pineapple, cranberry, and grapefruit. We both decided that pineapple was our favorite!

Next up was a stuffed French toast! Haley actually didn’t like it much, because it had berries and a berry compote on and in it. It also had some ricotta cheese—and I loved it! We waited a bit to order our next meal to share: a bacon omelette! Haley liked that a lot, thank goodness! It came with toast and home fries. I forgot to mention that we got some kind of raspberry breakfast bar as an appetizer—for free! The food was really tasty and it was a nice, relaxing brunch. For dessert Haley chose a vanilla creme brûlée with pistachio cake crumbs on top—yum!

After brunch, Haley and I had about two hours or so, until we needed to head to the airport. I had looked up a museum that was nearby 5Church, so we decided to walk there. The museum was called the Mint Museum. We walked about fifteen minutes uptown, but ultimately decided we didn’t have enough time to make the museum worth while. Plus, we had all of our luggage. We walked around for a bit and decided to grab one drink before heading to the airport.

We ended up in the same ally where we had stopped a few nights before, on the folly pub crawl. We had one drink and just relaxed for a bit, soaking up the sun. It had been such a fun sister trip! We called an Uber and headed to the airport. The drive was short and we went through security. It was the first time in a while that I went through non precheck—I forgot to take off my shoes, haha!

Haley’s flight was scheduled first, but we still had plenty of time. I had wanted to show her a lounge with my credit card, but the only one open at this airport was “grab and go” only, by AmEx. We each got a goodie bag filled with a water bottle, a chicken wrap, some chips, and a mini pumpkin pie. At least it was free! We spent the rest of our time at a terminal bar. We each had one drink and I figured out how much Haley owed me for the trip. We always just pay for everything together, then settle the tab at the end of the trip. It was getting close to Haley’s flight so we checked the status. Her flight was delayed about an hour, to our surprise! We looked out the terminal windows and found a huge storm raging! It had been so nice earlier, we were shocked!

We had some time so we wander around the airport. Haley’s flight kept getting delayed! We met some guys near Haley’s gate that build Sephora’s—isn’t that wild?! Eventually, Haley had to get on the plane. It was sad to see her go, but we had such a good time together in Charlotte!

My flight had been delayed as well. I spent my time going into every store I could find, trying to find a postcard. It was crazy! I couldn’t believe how hard it was to find postcards! Eventually I found a few. I also got a magnet and snacks for my trek across the country. My flight ended up being about three hours delayed! I had a window seat and slept for some of the trip home. I actually saw lightening from above the clouds—that was pretty crazy! I wrote some for my blogs and postcards and watched a movie that I don’t remember now. We landed in Seattle around 11:30. But since we were delayed, we had to hang out on the tarmac and wait for a gate for about a half hour, which was a bummer. Ingvar came and picked me up, thanks babes! He had spent the day at his best friend’s in Duvall. Wow, it was raining really hard, a typical Seattle welcoming, haha. Ingvar was really tired, he had spent the night before at a different friend’s place and stayed up super late playing video games. I had to talk to him the whole way, just to keep him awake. I don’t know how to drive stick shift, otherwise I would have drove us home. Also, some of I5 was completely closed and there was no detour labeled for us! Ugh! Thankfully, we got home right around 2 am. Poor Ingvar had to work a double the next day. I was pretty tired too, I had been up for 21 hours! Thankful for the amazing trip to Charlotte. :]

[extradan]

I finished Before The Storm

I really enjoyed the episodes and I really felt things during the third episode

But I feel kinda disappointed, the third episode was,,,,, really really short

And figuring out that the entire game just lead to telling Rachel the true or not as the final decision was kind of... a really big bummer, there wasnt really much to it, if i knew that these what the gmae was trying to lore me into, I’d feel like playing the game would be the waste of my time, understanding that my progress would be nearly as useless to come up with whats in the end.

I dont know, the end just left me empty, nothing to carry from, I didnt feel anything, I wasnt excited, wasnt sad, wasnt happy, wasnt intrigued or thrilled 

It felt like all the cut scene that came after the final decision could have been playable, but instead they just skipped a huge portion of what the game could have been and wrapped it in a video

I dont even feel like any of my inmportant relationships within all the characters in the game mattered in any way, the game didnt spesify them at the end

I was mean to my mom at the very first episode, and I dindt get to see how my relationship with my mom resulted at the end of the game, neither my relationship with David, the game in episode 3 tried to strike fear into me while making me to decide between taking his card or not, which i did allthough I really disliked him and didnt let him control me throughout the entire game, and I did keep the post card because i agreed to have a good relationship with david as long as hes willing to put effort into it, I didnt get to see him put his trust into me and I didnt get to see the result of my decision, it was just him engaging Chloe's mom, which im convinced it will be like that no matter what you choose

The only relationship between me and the characters that I got to see in the end scenes was Eliot, I dont even care about eliot! eliot meant nothing to the story or to me throughout the entire game, I didnt even recognize him at episode 3 and his only final approach to me was extremely toxic and god awful, why sohlud i care if he ripped a picture of me and himself?? why was it so important to skip everything else but the relationship between Eliot and Chloe??

The only minor relationship that isnt even with me that I was at least happy about is Ethan and the girl being friendly and happy together, which I was trying to help ethan to get in a better place throughout the game and prevent him from becoming a monster by giving him a happier life and someone to support him and help him

I feel like I could still help Rachel forgive her father after telling her the truth, but it just wasnt there 

the thing I was expecting about the ending the most was to link itself to the present of where the first Life Is Strage is occurring at 

The entire game i was like “no way they are not gonna make the final cutscene of Before The Storm about Chloe entering the school bathroom and being threatened by Ethan and getting shot, which was the most important highlight of how the original game started off, the biggest part of the game that determined the end of the original game

It doesnt tell why Rachel has gone missing from the city which I assume they will put it in the bonus episode “farewell”

it has so many plot holes and so many things that you did throughout the game that just meant nothing after all, Rachel wasnt even shown to get to see her mom which she was looking for the most

I thought the game was more about explaining how the storm formed, and not the adventures of Rachel seeking her mom who only got relevant in the third episode and gone away with a bitter to no potential to existing in there but to lead to choosing the relationship between Rachel and her father, James

The ending didint feel satisfying at all, it had nothing to it, I feel like being pulled by my hair and spitted in my mouth

Niether Damon gets what he deserves 

Its just so incomplete

Honestly, saying out all these stuff, the ending was just garbage

Im truly disappointed since the series are all about choice making, which all of your progress, all what you do in the game is to find out what happens in result to your actions, and its just nothing, there nothing there, its just nothing! you did all this, for nothing! why even be worried about your playthrough! 

I must admit that I did have a lot of fun playing the game and I could be playing the game non stop until I get a severe headache because it was interesting, but knowing that it was all for nothing, really ruins the experience, like eating your most dream like favorite food but instead just spitting it out after every bite

probably the worst part of it for me is that its in no way made a complete link to how the storm was formed, It;d be so much interesting if the entire game was about befriending with someone so perfect that they are the storm, that THey are the flauge, I felt like the entire game was trying to lead to the big twist that Rachel only manipulated you and created the catastrophic storm she caused, hell itd be cool if she had abilities like max, liek controlling the weather, and have her emotions control the atmosphere and causing the entire storm, making you realize that you helped that storm and put you through the shocking reveal

Its just so easy to make ends really great, im sure its extremely common for the basic human being to think through a great satisfying ending, if thats not true that I must be some kind of a super human, I feel like I could write the game myself and make it amazing 

I feel like no care or love or thought went into the last episode and the ending besides the very beginning

I just dont understand how people just give up so easily on things like that

I would understand if they just got tired at the very end of creating the game so they just didnt want to think through the ending anymore, but if you came up with the idea to create a sequal to a game, you probably must have thought of the biggest highlights and the shocking ending right before development 

idk man

the end really ruined it for me 

it sucks 

neither the symbol of the crow meant anything, I thought itd mean something since Chloe’s dad was explaining that the fire is attractive but the fire in its real form is jealous and it devours if you get close to it, and I thought the crow would be the symbol because crows are attracted to shiny things, which I assumed that Chloe is the crow in the story, and Rachel is the attractive fire that only at the end it destroys all

but no

whatever man  

[evilisk-played]

Labyrinthine December Part Final: Stat the Leftovers

...I just noticed that I added way too much TP to Okuu. Oops lol

Anyway, it’s time to finally address the last three postgame characters. In terms of LoT’s maingame, I’ve just been bumbling about and making huge mistakes like “buffing MND for my DEF tanks”, “buffing MAG for MND tanks like Iku”, “buffing both stats for composite attackers like Cirno” and other goofs.

For the postgame, there’s a statting guide I’ve been relying on for from MotK. It has been very, very good, since it has turned Mystia into a dungeon sweeping goddess and in the few cases I’ve not followed it (like Kanako having a MAG / HP spread of bonuses), it hasn’t turned out well.

= = =

Okuu:

This one’s a no brainer, Okuu needs MAG boosts. Okuu is no tank: I think a tank can have *only* one bad affinity, maybe two. Okuu has *three* bad affinities, however, and top it off, her attacks actually weaken herself (Chen style), and she offers no support so yeah, her defensive stats are not getting the bonuses. As for offensive stats: Okuu only uses MAG. 

I suppose you could make an argument for upping SPD, but I’m not about to make that one now. So we’re settling with MAG. And now, without further ado

Final Stats:

HP: 50k. This is not great. Her contemporaries in this category are... Chen, Orin, Sanae and Tenshi. Her contemporaries in the general character type of “tanky MND attacker” (which includes Eirin, Alice and Mokou) all have much, much higher health than her.

MAG: 74k currently. I think, pre-bonuses, her stat was like 40k, so this is a huge bump. Except for Marisa who is sitting at sub-90k (with extra skillpoints put into MAG), this puts her above MAG leaders such as Kaguya (69k), Alice (67k), Patchy (65k) and Kanako (64k).

DEF and MND: These sit at 25k and 26k respectively. It is fully worth noting that in relation to other tanky MND attackers, this is right around Mokou’s level (except that Mokou has shitty defenses so this is really not good). For comparison, Alice sits around 26k for DEF... but has 43k for MND. This stat is inflated by my main-game statting though. Eirin is at a firm, balanced 39k / 38k spread, but I’ve specifically been cultivating that balanced spread.

SPD: 1044 SPD ain’t bad. It definitely means she’s not slow, though with the exception of Suwako, she’s in the SPD class you typically see a lot of hardier characters in.

Overall Impressions: I don’t really know about her as an addition. My biggest issue is that there’s no shortage of MYS attackers (Marisa, Yuuka, Rumia, Reisen) or FIR attackers (Yuugi, Mokou, Alice, Orin). She’s not even the only FIR and MYS attacker, as Flandre exists, though she is infinitely safer to use than Flandre is. I also feel there’s a good chance I don’t end up using her since we’re at the endgame and I’d rather stick to the characters I know.

Thankfully, a New Game+ does exist for Labyrinth of Touhou 1 so I might get more use out of her there. 

= = = 

Keine:

Looking at her raw stats and abilities;

Keine has good HP growth, followed by okay SP, ATK and DEF growth. MND and SPD aren't bad choices. She doesn't use EVA or MAG but they're bad choices anyway.

Keine has two ATK spells and three buffing spells. Her ATK spells operate like Alice, in that her first spell targets DEF while her second spell targets MND. Her three buffs cover ATK, MAG and DEF. It's worth noting that Keine doesn't benefit from MAG, and Keine also can't cover MND, her defensive weak spot.

The play notes on the Wiki mention that she's got good HP growth, good affinities and her offensive buffs are pretty unique. Off the top of my head, this seems about right: Reisen, Maribel, Okuu and Chen can only buff themselves, Sanae and Iku can only buff one at a time, and Ran's buff is very slow. She’s only “competing” with Ran in this space, and Ran is used more for back row buffing, not front row.

I’ll admit that the offensive buffs are very, very appealing to me. While her ability to target DEF and MND with non-elemental spells are certainly interesting, I’d probably need to invest into her ATK stat for it to do good damage. And since I always, always, always put priority on survivability for my buffers, all I can say is...

Welcome to the party, DEF-build Keine! I look forward to utilizing your buffs. 

Final Stats

HP: 73k. They weren’t kidding about her HP growth. 70k is about where all my good supports sit (Yukari, Ran) and it’s just below HP growth powerhouses like Meiling, Yuugi, Sakuya and Remilia. Though technically not as impressive as the tanks, considering her upcoming stats, her HP is actually quite good. She’s certainly not going down without a good hit.

DEF: 48k. Make way for a new Queen in the DEF category. With bonuses, her DEF got bumped from 29k to 48k. Like I mentioned before, her HP might not be so great, but her DEF puts most other tanks to shame. It’s well above Sakuya (40k), slightly above Remilia (46k) and just below Meiling (50k). She’s far below Yuugi but Yuugi cracks under certain magical, elemental attacks. She’s got a similar MND weakpoint, but between the better SPD and affinities, she’s never as vulnerable as Yuugi can be in certain situations.

SPD: 1070 SPD. Again, not slow, but not particularly fast. Also again: much better than Yuugi’s SPD. 

Overall Impressions: It’s a bummer that we’ve been fighting a streak of MND targeting bosses, because Keine seems like she’d be useful in plenty of other fights. I’ll try to fit her into my party when I return to this game, though like with Okuu, I’ll get more time to experiment in NG+ next time

= = =

Yuuka

Yuuka seems like she can be built as an attacker or as a tank with support. In terms of raw stats, her current maxed stats would be:

HP: 59k SP: 1100 ATK: 24k DEF: 32k  MAG: 47k MND: 23k SPD: 837 Her affinities are solid, except for NTR (which is good) and FIR (which is bad)

In terms of raw stats, she’s pretty similar off to Kanako. Their SP’s and SPD are quite similar. While Kanako has a more even spread of DEF and MND, Yuuka’s is skewed towards DEF. I can’t compare MAG or HP since both have been manipulated for Kanako, though I know Yuuka has better, natural HP.

In terms of abilities, Yuuka has a concentration of NTR spells with one big MYS spell (which is her own version of Master Spark that is weaker, but targets groups). Her first spell is just a short delay attack spell, while her second and third spells are group spells with healing and rebuffing properties.

Yuuka has a short delay attack spell. It's not much though

Her second spell is a MAG-based attack spell that also happens to heal the entire party... this is amazing on first glance, until I realize it’s a percentage based heal (a la Eirin). 

Her third spell is another attack spell that heals stat debuffs (but only by half). Gonna be real though

Her final spell is Master Spark. It's slightly weaker, but it also hits groups of enemies. 

...It’s kind of hard to pinpoint what Yuuka’s specialty is. Having an extra Master Spark around is great, but idk, that feels kind of like overkill. Her support abilities are definitely a bit underwhelming; 10% of all HP is nothing. And I’ve said it before, but I’ll say it again; enemy debuffs have never been particularly intimidating to me, so a skill that halves them doesn’t seem great.

If I had to pinpoint anything unique about her, it’s the fact that she’s a NTR specialist. NTR is the second most underrepresented affinity. Your NTR characters are just Wriggle (a PSN attacker), Minoriko (a MND tank and healer), Suwako (a glass cannon) and Tenshi (a balanced tank) and of the group, only Suwako could be described as a dedicated attacker.

Yuuka can at least work as a secondary NTR attacker with more reliable group attacking spells. I’m not sure if any of the upcoming bosses will be weak to NTR but I do know a bunch of bosses in the maingame that she’d be clutch to have (cough Eientei cough). And I think that without affinities, she’s a tank with minimal support a la Yuugi (Flower Shot is fast, and group healing and rebuffing is probably useful SOMEWHERE).

...Man, this still hasn’t helped me decide where her points should go into. Time to test some things... If I put all 310 bonus stats into each stat, here is what I roughly get...

PURE DEF BUILD: With all her bonuses put into DEF, Yuuka’s DEF stat reaches 51k. This puts her at higher than everyone but Yuugi, though her HP stat is far less impressive overall. I’m not sure I like this tbh. 

SPLIT HP / DEF BUILD: With a 155 balance of HP and DEF, you get 72k HP and 41k DEF. This spread isn’t much better. A close comparison here is Sakuya, who has 40k DEF, consistently good affinities and SPD and... way more HP than Yuuka. I’m not sure I like this.

PURE MAG BUILD: With all her bonuses into MAG, she’s basically at Okuu levels of MAG which is impressive. Except for in the SPD category, she’s hardier than Okuu overall.

...Screw it, I’m gonna go with Yuuka being Master Spark 2.0. This is endgame anyway, I’ll have all of NG+ (when I unlock it) to give “Yuuka the NTR Tank” a fair shake. Here’s how she looks (with her stats boosted to Marisa levels)

And for comparison, here is what Marisa’s MAG stat is like

Hmm. I guess Yuuka’s MAG growth just ain’t as good as Marisa (I actually split Marisa’s bonuses into MAG / SP during the main game, so the fact that Yuuka isn’t even *close* with a pure MAG build is really telling).

But whatever, I’ll have the two Master Sparks, with the large fries and drink

...And with that Labyrinthine December is officially done!

I’ll probably clean up the remainder of the game at some point next year (I’ll post about it when I do, of course). Not sure whether I’ll be doing a Labyrinth of Touhou 1, New Game+ run or a ‘blind’ Labyrinth of Touhou 2 run next December, but I’m looking forward to continuing this series of games!

[c7thetumbler]

Life Update Notes: March 5th 2017

Hey everybody! I don’t think I can commit myself to doing things with any regularity, which is a huge bummer because I really wanted to force myself to make progress and not stagnate myself and break my own commitments.

But honestly, even though I fully intend to keep work at work and absolutely no more, actually living in a brand new place without any wiggle-room for cash until a couple paycheck roll in, as well as just being in an entirely different place in general has left me winded. I won’t go into all the things I’ve been feeling the past few weeks, especially since the worst of it has nothing to do with moving or work. It’s taken a toll on me, but trying to keep my chin up for the future.

Anyway, how did I even format these?

Living in Dallas

Honestly? Culture’s not that different from Irvine. Sure, people say yall and “Have a blessed day”, and are even generally friendlier, but so far it’s just been different people in a different place, but generally it’s more or less similar to if I had just moved out and still remained in SoCal.

Roads are shit though. And no; it wasn’t because of the traffic, Dallas. Your traffic is less dense than LA is at any given moment. No, your issue Dallas is your roads are stupid.

Let me explain: In Cali, freeway on ramps were typically handled with a bridge that had intersections nearby, and you wouldn’t have to wait to merge on easily. Roads on and around the bridges were two way, and very sensible. Off ramps dumped you at those intersections, where any signal made it clear who needed to go when. No need to have “yield” signs everywhere; if there was an accident it was because some idiot went when there was a bright red light telling them not to.

Another thing is that (at least where I had ever driven) major roads usually tried to stay in one direct, meaning you can take any number of parallel roads, and then cut over when you needed to get where you want to go just by knowing where the place was relative to you.

None of this is true in Dallas.

Your frontage roads are bullshit, one-way messes of confusion that waste space. Entering via these roads can be a huge pain in the ass, because a lot of places don’t even mark the onramp from these roads until after you’ve passed it. No, that’s not an exaggeration, It’s happened to me on 3 separate occasions. These being one-way roads also leads to getting to businesses  on these roads being a massive pain in the ass; forget ever turning left and feeling confident about it.

And Yielding. Fucking yielding. There’s this obsession with unprotected left turns here; the only streets that have green arrows on lights still also favor just the solid green light, saying to yield when you want to turn left becuase they just hate left turns or some shit. Also traveling on frontage roads means at any moment someone exiting the freeway could have to cut over several lanes until the next intersection, because off-ramps could go parallel for up to a mile before cutting in suddenly.

Fuckin, have some pictures

This is where the 5 meets the 405 in Irvine, CA. It looks kinda iffy at first, but it’s important to understand where the complexity in navigating these things are. You don’t see much perpendicularity at play with the freeways here; the normal streets do that. Speaking of which, look how there’s only one fucking street that deals with any of this: Bake Parkway, which you can use to go either north or south without having to worry about it. The Freeways themselves handle the rest; One simple on-ramp and you have long lines that don’t interfere with other roads at  all.

Now Let’s look at fucking Dallas.

“Wow C, that looks a whole lot simpler. I think you’re full of shit”

INCORRECT. LOOK AT ALL THOSE TURNS YOU HAVE TO MAKE. You’re coming from the East, and you wanna go south on the 75? First an intersection with the frontage road, which just had a bunch of people who exited the 75 going north frantically trying to get into their respective lanes while merging into traffic that already existed on that road. Now you cross over the freeway, make an unprotected left turn dealing with people also trying to get on and off the freeway and the normal traffic of the roads, and then get into your lane as soon as possible. And if you fuck any of this up, you’re either going the wrong way on a giant one way street, or you have to navigate the radial map shat on over a grid to try and approach the freeway at another angle.

AND THAT’S ANOTHER THING; FUCK THIS RADIAL STREET SYSTEM. Freeways were meant to take you from point A to Point B as fast as possible; not run you around the city to keep you equidistant from the center. Add in all of Dallas’ service, frontage, and toll roads, and suddenly you get shit like this all over the city as a common occurance:

So no, the issue isn’t the number of people on the roads, it’s the sheer stupidity of the roads themselves that throws all the cars at each other and  hopes they miss. And you can’t even fix this problem; it’s just fucked.

... You know what, we’ll call that my rant for the post

So what games have you been playing then you insanely angry man?

Fire Emblem Heroes, for a start. It’s grown on me, but there are aspects that are just pure garbage. I like the bite sized missions and it feels really rewarding to actually progress through, but man, it is dumb at times. The AI really like putting you in places where they’re going to spring a trap, and refuse to move until you fall for it. The potential thing is really annoying as well; hiding skills behind a prestige system that you can only bypass if you’re lucky. I like it, but it just has so many problems I’ll prolly drop it once I get a team up to Lunatic levels

...

I also dropped the D&D Campaign I was so excited to be playing last year due to personal reasons. Can’t think of a picture for that but I came to some realizations about what I as a player actually wanted out of the campaign for myself and others that just... weren’t happening. And clearly weren’t going to. I’d still love to play, so maybe someday with a different setting and arrangement I can get into it properly. It’s definitely made me understand what as a designer I should be looking to provide for my players, even if not directly in a tabletop context.

I do not have a Switch

And honestly I don’t intend to get one for a while; I was really looking forward to Bomberman R and Breath of the Wild, but apparently Bomberman R is shit, and while BOTW is amazing (apparently), it doesn’t justify the purchase of the first line of consoles. With no Virtual Console either I just have 0 interest in the thing; they dropped the ball at launch hard; I’d definitely bring this into work to play SNES games on my lunch break but holy shit your only really good launch software is a port of a WiiU game you wanted to release 2 years ago? Gonna need more than that.

Random thought:

Does consistently talking to yourself out loud but only when you’re at home alone seem crazy? I’ve been doing it a lot. Basically stream of consciousnessing out of my mouth. It could be just me telling myself what I’m doing, how I intend to do it, planning out my day, or even something as stupid as acting out conversations that have very little chance of happening.

I just don’t want to accidentally do it when people are around is all, really. That’d be weird

Anyway, have a good week everyone.

[steve0discusses]

Yugioh S2 Ep 21: Hey, It’s a Party, Lets All Get Kidnapped!

Ah, it’s been a while since I’ve worked on these. I’m back from my cross-country travels, I’ve overcome my food poisoning because of said travels, and I did like 2 Inktobers so I’m officially allowed to quit and then never do Inktober again till the end of the month so now that’s over with, lets get back to Yugioh. Thankfully, Joey is here to recap for us what has been going on so far in the show, via a phone call to his sister where he literally started off the episode saying this line.

It is episode 21, Joey has run out of excuses, and the crew has decided that now is the time to finally find their friend who definitely is being tailed by a murderer with psychic powers.

Because no one wants to ever call the cops on this show.

I can see why Yugi and Grandpa might not, since Pharaoh may have done some criminal nonsense before he reformed at the end of S1 (I mean Season Zero isn’t not NOT canon) and I can see why Joey might not because bro mentioned that he had some sort of dealing with the mini-Yakuza or something in Season Zero (I look forward to that). Tristan already thinks he is a cop so I can see why he doesn’t either. But maybe Tea should call the police. She doesn’t work at the must-be-18-to-work-here-so-it’s-probably-a-stripper-joint-after-10-PM burger place anymore, she’d be fine. Probably.

I mean they did illegally invade a country last season and was complicit in the removal of that country’s leader’s right golden eyeball so like...yeah...

But now that Yugi has the company of three people inside of his head and Kaiba alongside him--who is always communicating with Mokuba on his jacket walkie talkie (like he went out of his way to make a jacket that has solely one function because it clearly doesn’t keep him warm without those arms--and the function is to call up his little brother and complain about the people who are two feet away and can hear him complaining about them), but this means Yugi actually has more people in his 2-person party than the other crew of 4 people. Anyway, he’s certainly not lonely.

But first we gotta throw Tea’s phone around and have some comedy hijinks.

(read more under the cut)

Tea x Cell Phone giving me more energy than Tea x Yugi but that’s actually true of every teenager and their intense relationship with their phone. Accurate. Hell, it’s true of me as an adult.

I also love how they throw this phone in our face just to remind us how neither Yugi has called Tea or how Tea could easily call Kaiba AKA the guy in charge who knows where everyone is, since he’s in their High School phone book, but wtv. We gotta first sort out who’s gonna pick up Serenity from the hospital although her bandages aren’t even off yet.

We’ve already clarified how dangerous this whole tourney is, and the fact that during these finals they might be ground zero for when the world might actually stop functioning entirely, maybe don’t throw your blind sister into the mix? Girl has enough problems right now. Maybe keep her in the hospital preemptively. Y’all are probably going to end up there anyway. She can book you a reservation.

I do appreciate the Tristan stance in this shot.

Anyway, sensing that the crew might actually do something, Bakura decides to show up and make some mad insane nonsense again. Ah, our wild card, Bakura, our Charlie Kelly.

Lol What? His big master plan is to feign an injury? (I’m assuming this is fake? But he’s also sweating a whole lot? Maybe they had a fight club behind the scenes that got edited out?) But you know, if you’re gonna try to sell a broken arm then wouldn’t you want to like...wear an sling?

Wtv, we’ve already learned from last season that literally all these people are the very worst boy scouts and would absolutely die in the woods. Apparently they would also absolutely die if they had to administer actual first aid rather than vague card magic. I was kinda thinking that Marik miiiight be a better scout from all his tomb runs, but from the looks of it he’s too busy being as incompetently evil as possible to learn how to tie a simple bandage.

Nice that Bakura waited until the moment Tristan left to start being shady again. I guess that Bakura also remembers that one time that Tristan hulk-punched him so hard - in the shadow realm where mere mortals should not be able to even move - that God-Mode-Bakura passed out for like 45 minutes.

I’m a little confused at how this at all works with Marik’s plan, since it’s really not that hard to abduct Grandpa, but o well, this was the plan they went with. They ARE teens after all, and teens kind of live by the mantra of “I dunno, it seemed like a good idea at the time.” I guess it’s less complicated than making sure he watches a haunted VCR tape.

So off Grandpa goes with Bakura, meaning Gramps is probably going to be a card or some other sort of lifeless husk in a few episodes or so. It was a good run, Gramps.

Honestly, Bakura should just heavily suggest Gramps just go back to work the counter of his Super Gonna Curse You Weasley’s Wizard Wheezly’s, you know, the shop he actually owns. That shop who’s name is canonically “Turtle Game” (good name for a card shop, really gets it across. Great business decision.) And really, it’s been 2 days since he’s stayed open past 9 AM. Does he not pay rent? He seriously might not, we do not know who’s the owner of that house/shop. For all we know it’s Yugi’s Dad who is........somewhere?......

And speaking of missing people, the two most direction-less folks in the universe decided to make this show even longer when they could have easily skipped like 8 episodes if they had just crossed the street. Instead, they’re going to backtrack back to the Shamu exhibit while somehow not overhearing Bakura screaming in his British(?) accent.

Sometimes I’m impressed by all the well placed irony in this show. Here come the two God-characters of the A-team. One has the infinite reaches of technology, the other has the infinite reaches of dark magic. They can do anything except navigate a map and find their friends who are within I assume a 10-block radius.

Now I know, I know, Namu’s an actual name people actually have. Much like Mary Jane. Or AceBluntz420. But forgive me, I am from California.

Also I just went down a rabbit hole of K-pop and the only song I could find that said “tree” enough times was “tree of Sephiroth” which was a pretty good banger but not what I was going for. Again, I’m stymied by my naive, elementary level K-pop education. One day I will be a master of K-pop but I am yet just a newbie with a couple of Black Pink and BTS on my Spotify.

One day I will know enough about Kpop to know which of the songs are about romance and which are about weed but alas, I just like looking at the pretty lights and the pretty colors and the fun dancing like a newborn babe.

But anyway, couldn’t help but notice - THAT’S the name he actually chose for himself, huh?

I mean I looked it up and Namu is also a Buddhism reference in Japanese and that’s probably what the show makers were going for, but safe to say, Marik is clearly not a Buddhist. He is literally in charge of a Pharaoh cult. Well, used to be. It seems like Marik’s just out to destroy his own God. He’d be the hero in really any other anime with motives like that. Hm.

Honestly, if it wasn’t for Marik wanting to vaguely rule the world I’d probably side with him completely, lets be real. Pharaoh is kind of a huge problem. And while I do like Pharaoh now, it took me kind of a while, and if Marik showed up S1 I’d be like “Yes, finally, please kill the already dead insufferable ghost.”

So, Marik decides to become friends with Joey and Tea.

This sure was a lot of work to become friends with Joey and Tea. Did Marik not realize that if they’re also buds with a guy who is possessed by a ghost, they might have low enough standards that he doesn’t need to jump through any hoops?

Marik could have just walked up and said “hey, remember me? From class?” and these two would have been like “yeaaaah” because it’s been so long since they’ve attended that they would have had no idea that he was never enrolled.

Anyways, Pharaoh’s arrived to scream at the top of his lungs about a bomb threat at a theme park.

Bummer that Mako Tsunami finished his act and I guess went back to his home island on the back of another whale he had parked outside the theme park.

Also it says a lot about what this town goes through that Yugi, shouting about how everyone’s going to die, doesn’t seem to perturb a single member of this audience. They’re just like “shaddup, I’m looking at the large dolphin.”

The total amount of time that Marik could handle being friends with Tea and Joey : maybe about 30 seconds.

Which makes you wonder why he even bothered with this charade, but maybe he just wanted to get rid of Bakura because that guys kind of a mess.

And then just when I thought it would never ever actually happen.

It happened.

I don’t recall any era where non flip-phones had little antennae. I think this was kind of before my time. Good. Finally something on this show that I’m too young for.

Jokes on this mook for thinking he could ever crush a Nokia with his shoe. Actually impossible. I’m sure there’s Nokias that have outlived being run over by a Jeep.

Yo my payphones never had digital minute indicators on it. You can even read the numbers on the numpad? And there’s no gum lodged in the coin slot? This is not how I remember payphones.

Yo second thought, maybe those are 33 seconds and not minutes? Eh, what do I know, I’m a millennial, I don’t really remember how those awful things worked. RIP payphones, you were always spooky and the worst. Like honestly if a ghost Pharaoh would live in anything, it would be a payphone. If you ever had to use a payphone with a phone card, then you’d understand that it’s more an unsolvable puzzle than any puzzle pyramid.

And I guess that Mokuba just felt left out, so he decided to leave his brother and just wander off by himself on a rooftop where there’d be no witnesses?

Mokuba, why are you on the roof? How does everyone in Domino have roof access? And is the internet so bad in this town that you must be on a roof to get any signal?

please admire the leg wraps on this guy’s ankles. They’re like high fantasy legwarmers.

*why ever duel with cards when you can freakin fly*

WOW, KIDS SHOW. That sure is dangling a small child off a helicopter!

And like, Mokuba just hangs there for a while--no joke, he’s just hovering in the background of every shot for kicks and I’m just like...how did this kid’s show get made????? The 00′s was a different time.

This past week I’ve been watching my older brother’s 5 kids and so I’ve been watching their TV shows and youknow The Descendants 2 would have been a very different movie with edgy, rogue helicopters in it. Though I will admit Yugioh could do with a couple more dance sequences. (and Yugioh might legit have better fashion than The Descendants 2, why the hell was Cruella DeVil’s son wearing bright red baggy capri shorts to a cotillion ball? Anyway, I’m putting Descendants on my “possibly recap this later” list.)

I get that the intern who was putting this scene together might not have known about the helicopter incident in the shot right before this when they drew in these people just on the street on their cell but mannnnnnn.

I love the implication that this happens so often to children in Domino that no one freakin cares anymore.

Reminder that Kaiba refuses to believe in magic and has no idea wtf is going on. Like he knows there’s some yummy cards he wants--that’s it. He doesn’t think this is the end of the world, he doesn’t think anyone here is magic. He just thinks Yugi is a super weird kid from Spanish class who's voice keeps cracking and that Marik is some sort of weird mafia boss. He was not expecting this tourney to become kidnapping central and I mean no one could have predicted this next part either.

...

So Marik’s plan, lets just walk through it.

These two loose to Kaiba and Yugi, then these two violently pass out, Pharaoh runs over and shakes up the fat one for a little bit, and then Kaiba and Yugi go to a theme park. These two guys intentionally lost and got beat up for no reason?

And then, he sends the same people who have Already Lost back to Yugi and Kaiba, to use a different deck than the one they used the first time?

Why not use this amazing deck they had the entire time the first time? Why are all of Marik’s plans so roundabout?

I mean I guess they had to lure these two to the roof but not really actually--once you beat Yugi in a game then boom the puzzle is yours so you don’t actually have to...whatever, they’re on a roof and and it’s edgy and it’s scenic and it’s gonna get real Jack Baur on us.

oh man this workaround to “but they never actually go splat because they die before they hit the bottom” which is infinitely worse than actually just falling down.

So seeing no other solution, they decide to endanger the lives of hundreds of people and play this exploding rooftop version of Yugioh.

I mean last season we sure did go through a lot of time trying to get Kaiba off a ledge of a tall building and now he’s just...back on that ledge. Well. OK then. These kids and ledges.

Really was a line in the show that Kaiba listed the only two things these guys have done wrong and it’s like--well they used the wrong deck the first time. That was probably actually a really big thing they did wrong. Also they could have kept Pharaoh in an infinite rock-paper-scissors loop but passed up on the opportunity. TBH these guys make a lot of mistakes but we’ve been over this before, Kaiba can only remember 2 things. Weird that this has become canon, but here we are.

I guess Kaiba suddenly remembered he had a grudge.

He forgot for a few episodes, but the grudge is back. He must have written it on the back of his hand “don’t forget you hate Yugi” and then when he went to  scratch an itch was like “OMG I can’t believe it, I forgot again!”

That bean.

Anyway, next week, on Yugioh:

Does Kaiba’s helicopters get into a helicopter fight with Marik’s helicopters and keep Mokuba dangling there the entire time? Does Joey get to throw a couple mooks over his shoulder like that time he took on 18 ruffians in a warehouse or will these ruffians be too ruffian even for Jo? Will Tea, after her hearts been consumed by darkness, and she becomes a nobody or a heartless or whatever, realize that she’s dating a dark wizard this entire time so it literally doesn’t matter?

Anyways, I mentioned K-pop so here you go, a moment of happy handsome boy Zen in this overwhelming world.

[yahoo-puck-daddy-blog]

Puck Daddy Countdown: No guarantees for Henrik Zetterberg

Has Henrik Zetterberg played his last game? (Getty)

6. Arbitration

One of the things that’s stupid about arbitration in the NHL is that every time you hear “The team came in at $1 million and the player is asking for $3 million,” you can feel good about betting your entire life savings on “The arbitrator’s going to give him $2 million.”

A lawyer on Twitter with a locked account who I’m therefore not going to link to said there’s a pretty simple reason for this: If an arbitrator goes in one direction or the other — that is, if the player or team makes a compelling case for their number — the side that “loses” has the power to fire that arbitrator. If you split the difference, nobody’s happy and everyone is simultaneously.

But that kinda takes all the intrigue out of the arbitration process, and really makes you wonder how on earth Jacob Trouba’s took six damn hours. The artifice of it is appalling — why not just come up with your numbers and split the difference right away — but that’s all billable hours I guess.

Anyway, it’s stupid.

5. Overvaluing your own players

So the Canucks re-signed Troy Stecher the other day to a two-year deal with a $2.325 AAV, which sounds just about right I think. But the way that worked out for Canucks fans, you’d think they just got the steal of the century. Oh my god Troy Stecher, wow he’s great!!!

And it’s like, “Is he?”

Don’t get me wrong, he seems like he’s fine. But he doesn’t really move the needle in terms of, say, underlying numbers and he has a grand total of 35 points in 139 career games and he’s already 24 years old.

This is one of those things where he was highly touted coming out of college (probably a little too highly) because he scored a good (but not massive) amount on a very good team. This is a guy who averaged less than 19 minutes a night and was basically used as the sheltered No. 4 defenseman on a Canucks team with Mike Del Zotto as the No. 2, so you tell me how good he is, really.

The answer seems to be “not very.” Don’t get me wrong, it’s good to have useful depth players and he’s definitely one of them, but lower-end middle-pair defenseman seems to be his quality level, if you even want to call him that much, aren’t the kinds of guys you should be celebrating if you’re even moderately well-run. The Canucks are of course not moderately well-run, so fair play there, but does it really serve you to get your hopes up about a guy who can’t even crack this Canucks team’s top-three? I feel like probably it doesn’t.

4. Zetterberg?

Seems like there’s not a lot of info out there right now about whether Henrik Zetterberg — who very quietly had 11 goals and 45 assists in a lost season at age 37 — is going to play next season, which is weird.

I know everyone wants to give all due caution with respect to his health and, yeah, he’s 38 so that’s pretty old for a hockey guy of any quality, let alone one who probably doesn’t want to just be a token addition because of Who He Is.

But still, it’s weird that we might have seen Zetterberg play his last game (in the NHL at least) to literally no fanfare. Imagine if he just kinda retires? That would be bizarre.

(By the way, did you know Zetterberg doesn’t have 1,000 career points? He’s only at 960. Now granted, 22 other guys over 37 have scored 40 in a season in the lockout era, nine of them more than once.  Zetterberg is absolutely good enough to do that. If he can stay actually play and his team doesn’t totally crap out on them. Neither of those things seem like guarantees. Bummer.)

3. Getting your hopes up

Speaking of the Canucks, there sure seems to be a lot of talk about whether Quinn Hughes, who apparently dazzled at rookie camp, will bail on the University of Michigan to sign with Vancouver before the season starts.

I could see it going either way, to be honest. I don’t think Hughes would struggle at the NHL level because of what he did at Worlds and how he plays a very modern game. But at the same time, what would he play in the NHL, like 15 or 16 minutes a night? At Michigan he would probably play more like 25-plus, get top power play minutes, all that kind of stuff.

It’s an interesting question as to what’s better for his development in the long run, but if it’s me making the call here I don’t try to sign him despite the local pressure. Let him make that decision if he wants to but I’m not leaning on him at all.

Zach Werenski, a guy I’ve compared Hughes to a lot (not just because they both went to Michigan), went back for a second season and now he’s really good. Would he have helped in a doomed season in Columbus a few years ago? I dunno, but probably not. Hughes is in the same boat. Why burn a year of his ELC when the team’s gonna stink?

2. Making a comeback

All this stuff about “Jaromir Jagr isn’t sure about an NHL return this season but it probably won’t happen” is some very “no kidding” stuff. The Flames bounced him, no one was interested because he was injured after that.

He says it’s his goal to make it back and I believe him, but he’s 46 and might not be able to stay healthy. Might be the end of the line, at least in North America. That, too, is a bummer.

1. The waiting game

The other thing I don’t like about arbitration is how spread out it is. That’s done for logistical reasons, obviously, but there are a few guys whose numbers will be really interesting if the process gets that far.

Brandon Montour today can maybe make a case for a decent chunk of change.

Jason Zucker on July 28 will be fascinating.

I wanna see that Cody Ceci number on Aug. 1 for a real solid laugh, probably on both sides.

Kevin Hayes on Aug. 2 and Mark Stone on Aug. 3 are two guys I bet get super lowballed by their teams.

And then on Aug. 4, that William Karlsson hearing could be hysterical.

Again, that’s all “if it gets that far,” which it so often doesn’t. But those are the guys where I’m really hoping it gets that far.

(Not ranked this week: Unsigned veterans.

And speaking of unsigned free agents, one of the things I always think sucks at this time of year, but which definitely makes sense from a team perspective, is when a guy like Toby Enstrom has to sit around all summer waiting for the phone to ring. These are guys who can play a bit but probably isn’t worth a huge multi-year deal or anything, and clubs just take a ton of caution with them.

Like obviously it behooves a team that has use for an early-to-mid-30s player to just give him a training camp invite in September, because it’s not like there’s a line of employers around the block for him. And it’s not just Enstrom, because there’s always a handful of guys who can meaningfully contribute but it’s easier to just give them a PTO and, maybe, a $1 million, one-year deal.

But for those guys? No good.)

Ryan Lambert is a Puck Daddy columnist. His email is here and his Twitter is here.

(All statistics via Corsica unless otherwise noted.)