#but it can't achieve that because it was left unfinished

[gamebunny-advance]

Hm.

Imagining Kun3h0 and GAB as mascot horror characters.

[sixth-light]

I've been thinking a lot lately* about how artistic works are so intimately products of their moment and in conversation with it, and how easy this is to overlook both in terms of discussing a work and in terms of anticipating or considering new additions to an older work.

The first is important because so many judgements that can be made about a work are only meaningful when you know what their context was. What readers need or want to see, particularly in terms of representation, is hugely mediated by what else is available to them at the time. Yeah this is about stuff like "Rocky Horror was progressive when it was created" but also it's about stuff like "the John Carter movie bombed because it was regarded as derivative", when in fact the source material originated a bunch of the 'derivative' scenes and tropes that were then used by better-known movies before a John Carter movie ever got made.

The second is important because...even if you come back to a work, as a creator, you can only make new parts of it as the person you are now, in conversation with the world and genre as it is now, not as it was when you started. Taking a mildly-infamous-among-fantasy-fans example, Melanie Rawn's unfinished Ambrai trilogy; she's often said that she can't finish it because her life has moved on and...as sad as I am it was never finished, I think that's probably smart! She could write a third book one day, maybe, but it never could or would be the third book she would have written in the 1990s. And even if she did manage that somehow, the genre has moved on in such a way that it would feel weird and probably quite offputting to read a book doing with gender and feminism what the Ambrai books were doing in the '90s, because they are/were inherently in conversation with an era of fantasy that is now past.

All of which is to say that:

as a reader (or watcher) I think it's good to hold in mind, when engaging with a work from a time and/or place unfamiliar to you, the extent of what you don't know about the context of the work

as a creator, I think it's good to be very realistic about what you're going to actually achieve when you are making something over a long time period or coming back to something you left unfinished. You can totally do that! It can be incredibly rewarding! But the thing you make now is not the thing you would have made then, probably not even the thing you imagined you were going to make then, and that's just the nature of art.

*The reason I have been thinking about this is partly books I have been reading (Mara of the Acoma, you are my blorbo) and partly a very fun podcast I have been listening to which has re-read The Ruins of Ambrai and done a lot of discussion about its context, finishing up with a great interview with Kate Elliott about writing fantasy in the '90s (and writing it now, as she is still writing great but different books!). Anyway go listen to the Hot Nuance Book Club, it's a good time.

[ravenstargames]

✦ Lost in Limbo Devlog #8 | 02.06.24

AHA! It's February (has been for a few days, but I've been a bit busy as per usual) so that means another Lost in Limbo devlog! We have been recovering from our wrap-up, working left and right, and oooh boy aren't things getting interesting. Let's jump into it, shall we?

First of all...

🎉🎊🎊THE DEMO CGS ARE DONE!🎉🎉🎊

Raquel has worked SO HARD to achieve this, and the results are simply amazing. We could never ask for a better artist, and we can't wait for you all to see and experience every CG for yourselves. Sadly, we made a promise of only showing Gael and Amon's, so you'll have to wait a bit more for the others! ; v ;

And next! You thought we were finished with the characters?! NOT BY A LONG SHOT! As you may remember, our demo script went through a few changes, but this secondary character remains! We don't want to talk about them too much, but we also wanted you to have a taste of them, as they'll be the first character you'll meet... 👀💜

Our plan is to finish this sprite and then move on to the character's expressions. We have to figure out the most efficient way to work on them, though!

The dreaded section—but THIS MONTH we come with a wonderful announcement...

✨🎆Airyn has joined the team!✨🎆

And you'll ask, who's Airyn?! Well, she's an amazing person we met during our master degree; we have been developing a friendship for a while now, and as we needed an extra hand with our backgrounds, Airyn offered us her help! She's an incredibly talented concept artist who loves working on backgrounds, and we are so so thankful for her help! We literally couldn't ask for a better professional to join us during our demo journey :')!

You can see some of Airyn's work on her ArtStation, here!

She has already started to work on our unfinished backgrounds, and so far we can offer you this fantastic WIP of one of the places you'll visit in the demo! 💜

But Astro is not far behind! He's getting our last background ready, and so far he's doing an impeccable job! We hope these mysterious places are piquing your curiosity, because we definitely can't wait for you to visit them!

I'm reaching page 100 of our script, having left behind a few things to correct! Only 40~ pages left, which means soon we'll make a second round of editing and correcting. Allie is almost done with their first editing process and that's very exciting! We can't honestly thank her enough for her incredible job 💜(I think I say this a bit too much, but we gotta be thankful on this team!)

The CG's have been programmed and they work so far! Now each character has a CG to be unlocked and seen in full HD, and each in their own gallery, hehe. Next I'll have to play around with the credits because I was having trouble with something last time I tried to get them done—but as always, I'll get it done one way or another!

This month we have worked hard! January has been a good start of the year I think. I hope we can speed things up a bit now that we have Airyn to help us with the backgrounds, and hopefully she'll be a permanent addition to the team if everything goes well! I don't want to jinx it, but I feel I can see the end of the tunnel little by little. Planning stuff, looking up different things, getting busier and busier...Let's see if February, even if short, proves to be a productive month!

Also, we hope you all have been taking care and the start of the year has been nice to you. There's so many amazing things happening in the indie otome community, so make sure to enjoy it all! 💜

[wild-flowerhoney]

i'm neutral about solangelo on my best days and this is not one of them so... new wip??

nico, turning fifteen years old in a camp that still does not accept him, ugly whispers and pointed stares following him around. and will solace.

nico, turning fifteen with red welts on his skin where too warm hands grab and hold. keep in place. sitting at the edge of the lake with the same hero he'd once worshipped – and percy's eyes are worried, trailing over his skin, over those red imprints. he knows this, has seen this before. – and still nico stays and justifies. not because he's weak or dumb or doesn't know or anything like that, no, it always goes deeper than that with these kind of things – all the awful things we call love. all the awful things we accept because they're the closest thing to love we have.

fifteen is a peculiar age, one of hurt.

sixteen is much the same.

seventeen is a caught breath – let me help. let me make sure it will stick this time. i can't do it if you don't let me. seventeen is the yes stuck in his throat. sticky and blood red.

eighteen is a coughing fit – eighteen is the leaving. eighteen is sally jackson's kitchen at 3am with the too bright light and a cup of cocoa cooling between his hands. eighteen is oh, darling, you don't have to tell me. it's different except it's not. it's all the same kind of violence at its core.

nineteen and twenty are for falling – find his footing and mess it up the very next moment because what is nico, if not an unfinished thing? barely able to stand without curving under the weight of anger and regret and hunger, inevitably breaking?

twenty-one is the first full breath, rattling in his ribcage – the first job that makes him want to curl up under the sheets and never emerge, the tiredness in his bones at the end of the day. the sharp inhale of the cool morning air, i am tired and i never thought i'd be breathing but i do it anyway. forcing air into his lungs because what is nico, if not stubborn?

twenty-two. twenty-three.

breathe.

twenty-four is for firsts – a room that belongs to him, just barely big enough to fit what little he has left. percy shows up with lamps and curtains and a whole new set of mythomagic cards from a store near his own place, sally dusts every surface and bakes cookies in the tiny kitchen area. there's a hades figurine on the windowsill, worn books on a shelf by the entrance, an array of pillows and soft sheets on an almost too big bed. it's home, completely and undeniably his. it's a first.

twenty-five is an achievement – twenty-five is ten full years since he first sat beside that lake, beside the same man that is at his side now, and acknowledged that something was happening. twenty-five is bittersweet. it's been ten years, the lake looks just as it did back then. the two of them really don't. hands holding onto one another, breathing in the warm night air. a soft kiss on his knuckles.

twenty-five is the beginning.

[thinkdust]

August 13th, 2024

I tried not to relate to a lot of the "your 20s are this and that" crowd noise because I felt it to be too generic or label-defining. But in the past few months, it feels like I understand that sense of rush of accomplishing all your goals at once, and simultaneous drag as you watch people around you do everything better, faster and easier than you.

While you just wait, for some happenstance, some miracle to finally push you into overdrive. No matter how much of a hermit-like existence you try to achieve, unaffected by the humdrum of the world, you still get caught up in it's ever-expanding web and before long, you're at the epicentre of chaos, just flailing arms and a bobbing head, struggling to breathe barely enough to survive.

My own 20s are I feel, like this noose round my neck that keeps tightening itself and the more I try to push away and ask for some leeway, the harsher it pulls.

To achieve academically, professionally, financially, socially, maritally, every-fuckin-thing-ally before this unfaithful clock runs out, it's just too much. It's too much of everything, and everything that's wrong.

No wonder people make some of their worst mistakes in these years, but what choice do we have? It's like you were spat out of the womb in your teens and onto an inclined full-speed treadmill in your 20s.

Uncooked, unprepared, unfinished, just navigating through life-altering decisions left, right and centre.

And for those that had or have it easy, well, they're the ones that will shine the brightest and burn the fastest, but hey, that's what counts right? Now or never! It's Carpe Diem not "Carpe at-your-own-pace"!

These are the scariest years and all that we were promised, all the luxury of freedom and adventure, well, turns out mostly it was either a far-fetched dream or a reality just for a select few with the premium subscription on Life™!

And as we tread through these unknown waters, where everything we knew is constantly changing at a rate nearly impossible to keep up with, our only lifeline, we've been told is "ourselves". I wouldn't trust myself to take care of an inanimate object without breaking it let alone a barely-functioning human being.

But hey, all the advice we can get is "C'est la vie though, right?" And I can't explain just how hard it gets when it feels like the universe is hell-bent against you, to "make you learn important life-lessons firsthand and early on", whatever that bullshit is.

And how every day that you make through feels like a boulder collapsing on your head with a catastrophic degree of regret of unlived lives, while simultaneously lifting its weight from us as the release of inevitable death draws nearer.

So maybe the other side of this gets easier and less painful but hey, that's if we make it out alive, and last I checked, the chances of that happening are lowering as we speak.

- thinkdust 💌

P.S. felt a rant boiling up in my cranium so here's the word vomit

[prompt-master]

The Answer Was Within The Contradiction

A short fic: After the events of sdr2, Hinata finds himself attempting to recode Nanami. He and Kamakura talk about it

Before it all would have seemed like sci-fi nonsense to Hajime. A world made of zeroes and ones, a contagious disease made from the human psyche, an animalistic human slaughter game for outside entertainment. A synthetic girl.

There was a time before Hajime lived and indulged with this fictional world. And there was a time where he forced himself to be so interwoven with the fiction that a permanent reminder stared back at him in the mirror and whispered into his mind. All he had left was hindsight and painfully distinct memories.

"You are a paradox," Izuru told him often, "Your very existence is a word of defiance."

And once Hajime got a taste of defiance, he found himself craving it at all possible avenues.

"Haven't you already defied enough? Look around you."

Hajime knew he asked for too much every time he saw the bittersweet expression of a grieving man on Makoto's face, stark even behind a video screen. Hajime knew he was already quite possibly the luckiest unlucky guy next to Komaeda Nagito himself. He was here. He was alive. He was real. With most of his friends alive, when no one should be.

But it was that one lost friend that haunted him, that left Hajime hungry to defy the odds once again.

"There are things even we can't do."

Hajime suddenly inhaled sharply. He shoved away from his desk, allowing the office chair he was sitting in to roll back with the force. Count to ten. He reminded himself, head leaning over the backrest. He let the numbers roll over him, resisting the urge to start pulling out his hair.

It wasn’t about possibility anymore, this was about necessity. Hajime’s new life was defined by impossibilities lining themselves up into a confusing labarynth, but he would be damned if he couldn’t navigate it one way or another.

He wiped his brow, then muttered under his breath “Shut up.”

“I am free to speak my mind just as you are.”

“Yeah, well…” Hajime dragged himself back over to his desk, leaning over the computer. He was greeted not for the first or last time by complex codes weaving themselves in ways he would never properly understand. Yet, at the same time. He understood them perfectly. The breakets and loops and command lines built an unfinished art piece in his mind, one he craved to finish crafting. He began typing again, letting unknown knowledge blanket him once more. “You can at least keep it to yourself.”

“Why should I keep it from you, when we are so close to one another?”

Hajime resisted the urge to roll his eyes, Izuru really could act like a child at times. “Because it’s unhelpful. I only want to hear something helpful right now.”

“Then allow me to provide you with some advice.”

Hajime’s fingers jittered over the computer keys, stumbling to a halt. He tsked, wishing Izuru had a body outside his own so that he could kick him out of the room.

“You can not achieve your goal in the way you wish it to be achieved.”

“I didn’t ask for advice, especially not that nonsense.” Hajime glared at himself through the screen.

“It goes against basic logistics.”

“Well then, it’s a good thing that those basics mean nothing to me.”

"Allow me to provide meaning, then."

"I didn't sign up for Siri to be in my head…" Hajime mumbled under his breath. Izuru pretended he didn't hear the words.

"Coding is unique to the coder and without the original files or notes it is nearly impossible to replicate a project as complex as the one you chose."

Hajime felt a headache beginning to brew, attempting to tune out the points Izuru reiterated to him

Over

And over

And over and over.

Hajime bit his tongue, grinded his teeth, and held his breath. He tried to focus on his typing. Or the screen. But each "furthermore" and "lest we forget" caused a sizzling burn deep in Hajime's soul that made the characters blur.

"-You simply don't know what you're doing-"

With a snap and a pop the frustration built up enough that the world set itself on fire. Hajime slammed his hands down onto the desk. He was ready to strangle the man in his brain.

"Then why-" Hajime asked through gritted teeth, "Are you helping me?"

There was a great long pause. A pause where silence was his only answer. for a moment Hajime couldn't even feel the ever looming presence of Kamukura lingering over him. A few months ago, Hajime would have nearly collapsed from relief. He would have savored this sliver of peace in his hands. Instead, Silence felt synonymous with Emptiness.

Hajime roughly exhaled through his nose.

And perhaps, synonymous to Loneliness as well.

When Hajime felt the spark return to his fingers and mind, he hardly hesitated to return to frantically typing out line after line after line of code. He couldn't let the opportunity pass him. No matter how misplaced it felt.

It was odd really, getting to be so intimate with a man designed to be his replacement. But in the end as Hajime grew closer and closer by force he also realized there was an unnerving but comforting truth in their relationship. Hajime and Izuru were two parallel lines, similar in so many aspects that they nearly held the same formula, the same meaning. There was an inherit understanding of one another, and where they were heading. Despite the fact that Izuru was meant to be perfect where Hajime was flawed, Hajime couldn't help but be reminded of his younger self when he finally got to see Izuru in action.

But despite the parallelism that binded them together, there was a truth that could not be ignored. There would always be a distance between the two. No matter how close they became, they were asymptotic curves, they were parallel lines, they were never going to cross.

“... Do not ignore these valid critiques. I do encourage you to attempt such a feat, but you should be aware of what will never be.”

Hajime shook his head. He could feel the heartbeat pulsing within, he could feel the cold hand holding his on a summer morning, he could see the sweetest smile that sent sparks down his spine. She lay dormant under his fingertips, pressed between the little crevices of the keys. All he had to do was piece her back together, and then he would get to hear her say his name again.

He was pulled away from that image, as the cold bitter points reiterated themselves once again.

“AI by design is something difficult to replicate as it is ever changing and ever learning.”

“I know that.”

“As it learns, it changes how it will react to the information given to it in the future, which further shapes the AI. If this is true, it is nearly as difficult to recreate as a human consciousness, where each individual factor greatly shaped one's personality.”

“Ok. Cool.”

“And you do not have the original files that Nanami Chiaki-san was trained on.”

"I know."

“Even if you were to show this fabrication of a fabrication the killing game files, that would only offer the AI to train on it from a perspective outside of what the original Nanami-san experienced.”

“I know.”

“Then you must know that this could never be her.”

Hajime attempted to hide the burn of his tears from the

only

one

he couldn't hide them from.

In that moment, Izuru felt like a hand awkwardly hovering over his shoulder. Asymptotic. Parallel. Why oh why did they leave their Ultimate Hope so emotionally empty? What purpose did that serve? Why did they take that from IzuruHajime?

"I… simply cannot comprehend why you would willingly put yourself in the shoes of Sisyphus."

Hajime saw sparks in his vision with how roughly he kneaded his fists against his eyes. "I don't know what that means."

"This is a task that is clearly emotionally taxing for you. You have not slept or eaten properly since attempting it. I have been the one taking care of our body in your stead. One could consider this some form of self-inflicted torture. And yet you continue to push through it, while being fully aware of the impossibility of the task. All to bring her back."

"You said it yourself," Hajime mumbled, forcing himself back into those shoes. He continued typing, with a pain in his heart that felt akin to working with blistering burns on his fingertips. "I have hope. Or whatever."

"I feel as though I still don't fully understand hope."

"Did you even understand despair?" Hajime spat.

And loneliness answered.

"You can't understand what we had, either. You weren't there."

Hajime could feel the subtle rustle of Izuru's trademark annoyance, something only noticeable to someone sharing the same brain. Even Izuru lacked the emotional foresight to recognize the bristling emotion, no matter how muddled.

"I understand plenty. As the Ultimate Analyst-"

"It wasn't a statistic, it was a relationship. You couldn't understand. The only person you ever bonded with was Enoshima fucking Junko."

Count to ten. Count to ten.

Hajime didn't realize how shaky his breath had become, how furious his typing seemed. For all the bonding he and Izuru did after the Neo World Program there was still a part of Hajime that feared and resented him.

"... I believe that I did quite like the Nanami AI program."

But Hajime also pitied him.

"Did you even know her?"

"It wasn't long. We met for just one small conversation before I plugged the Enoshima Junko AI into the Neo World Program."

"So she knew…?"

"No. I temporarily shut her off before uploading it."

"Kamukura…" Hajime floundered to understand the point of all this. He just wanted to work. To create. To craft. To rebuild. He wanted her back. A part of him wondered if he was playing god but another part of him didn't care at all. He was willing to break all the rules if it meant there was a chance they could meet again.

Everyone else got a chance.

Izuru's voice was as bland as ever, but lined with softness that called his attention, "I understand why you want to rebuild her."

Hajime pursed his lips, "You're not going to tell me you want her rebuilt cuz she's some. Savant tech or something, right?"

"When I brought Enoshima Junko into the Neo Word Program, it was a test."

Hajime did roll his eyes this time. "You've told me this before."

Izuru had no clue on the proper standings of Hope vs Despair. He only knew the nonsense both Hope's Peak Academy and Enoshima Junko threw his way. With two extreme ends of the spectrum lining his vision, he found himself with a scenario he could not predict. He knew, but did not understand why, that Hajime would be placed into the game in his stead. And, he also knew that by placing Enoshima within his path he'd be creating the Ultimate Trial By Fire.

Hajime was proof Enoshima was wrong. Hajime was proof that hope could be just as powerful. Hajime was proof of the impossible. Hajime was the contradiction.

"You have a penchant for proving me wrong." Izuru said. "Perhaps you can do it again."

Maybe Izuru did understand Hajime's desperate desire, just a little bit.

After all, Izuru's photographic memory left him with an unexplainable moment to look back on. A moment he did not understand, yet could not stop reviewing.

Because of course, he remembered talking to the Neo World Program’s AI very briefly.

And even more unfathomable, he remembered quickly deciding to temporarily shut her off before uploading the Enoshima Junko AI. For what purpose? It's easy to find reasons after the fact: in case she had any safety protocols, so that she did not alert anyone of the unwanted addition, so she did not attempt to remove the file.

Izuru was the only one who knew he did it as an odd, questionable act of mercy.

He didn't think he would ever truly be able to pick apart the why's of his decision, none of it made a lick of sense. What mercy would Chiaki have truly been granted? She still would have been within the program, knowing something was wrong. She still ended up deleted, after watching multiple people she was entrusted to protect die. She left this world believing she had intrinsically failed at what she was supposed to do.

So what mercy had Izuru fooled himself into believing for that fraction of a second? So she wouldn't blame herself for the upload? So there was nothing she could have done?

Why had he even done anything in the first place? Why her?

Was it because they were both man-made creatures of hope? Nothing more than a programmable personality, the most useful tool available to their creators yet easily replaceable. Was it because neither of them were real people? Was it because, despite everything he had allowed to happen, she was happy to see him?

Or was it because the very circumstances of their births led them down a long, cursed, unlucky life?

Izuru was supposed to be a man made God. Izuru was intrinsically programmed to be able to do anything. To be even meaningless things like lucky. And yet, he wasn't. Even know, he finds himself with one of his first foggy thoughts of desire and he could not act on them. He was a God that couldn't create a miracle.

Hajime though? He was more than just lucky. He was sci-fi. He was fiction. He was the labyrinth. He was the impossible. The unknowable. The unpredictable. He was living proof that Nanami Chiaki could be reborn. His consciousness was tossed away like an outdated file, scraped and deleted without a single care. He was erased, destroyed, burned, mutilated. Murdered by his own design.

But here he stood.

He should have never been able to come back. Yet here he was, existing in a way that even Kamukura Izuru couldn’t fully understand. It was knowable, but not explainable. Why then, if this state of rebirth could exist for Hajime, could it not be extended to others? She at one point existed in this world in similar contradictory limbo, both alive and dead. Both sentient and programmed. Both human and fake. The question then was, if Hajime could survive through that same limbo, why can't she? If Hajime, a man who lived a majority of his life lacking any special traits, can be worthy of a second chance, then why can’t she?

He was proof of her existence.

“Hinata-kun?”

And she was proof of his.

[orphika]

TW: self pitying crap, suicidal inclinations (of a type), being a shitty boyfriend.

Coleottero, amore

I'm sorry.

I failed you. I failed to prevent your suffering, just like always. And when you needed comfort, where was I? Spitting bile, drowning in my own fury. I can't – you're always going to martyr yourself. My trying to curb that? Apparently that's wrong. "Listen to yourself..."

Truth is, Nero is better than me. He gets away with shit I'm given hell for; I KNOW I CAN do this crud, but when do I get the chance? He knows exactly how to break me every time – the sheer fucking shame of existing gets right through me. I feel guilt. I give a shit. I am weak and he is strong.

I can't even keep you safe in my own fucking home. He knows where we live. The goddamn sofa surfing shirt stealing soul slaving fucking investment banking hobo even beats me there, he's HOMELESS and somehow that's a win! And he can just – walk in. What can I do? Hurting him doesn't make a difference, he's been tortured to hell and back and it just made him like he is. He won't remember anything he doesn't want to for more than a week, and he doesn't take anything I say or do seriously even though he throws worse tantrums over less issue every fucking night. He's a crazy fledgling brat and I can't stop him doing whatever he wants to us –

I failed you. Even now, you're hurting, and I'm mad about him and me. I'm not here to do the one thing I always can... pick up the pieces... because I'm a selfish ass and it's all got to be about me.

I don't deserve you. I don't deserve any of our life together. What you can't keep isn't yours... and I can't keep you, and this, without becoming just another Riccardo. Something you and our Angel insist is wrong. I don't know what's right any more.

All I ever really achieved was getting you turned into a window box, then unbound, then exiled, then into conflict with him over and over, and broken. I brought you to this awful place. You suffer because of me.

Keys to everything are on the coffee table. House is yours now. Good luck. I wish you joy of it.

Maybe this is finally me giving you something good? I don't know.

I'm sorry.

I should have backed off. Left you and Finn –

I'm sorry.

I'm going to rest, now. I won't die. Promise you that. But I don't have to live either. That's what we are. The third option.

I love you. But by itself that isn't enough.

Don't worry. And don't encourage me. Don't try to tell me any of this matters

[ The above handwritten note, evidently unfinished, is screwed up in the firebucket in Lot 404, but not yet burned. Drive by REM is playing on the sound system, on repeat. Orpheus' room – the master bedroom – is fully rigged for Beetle Rest, but he's not there. He seems to have taken a Hieros Gamos formula, his razor, the bulletproof suit and boots, and the Telecaster. ]

[ @duskbornbitchqueen ]

[theusosroomcc]

the The Sims 4 Graveyard of abandoned, unfinished and removed content

Hello! I made a list of most of the things in The Sims 4 that were introduced but then abandoned, unfinished features and removed features. If you have something else to add, don't hesitate to leave a comment! So, let's get started to this really extensive list!

Stuff Packs Introduced in The Sims 2, Stuff Packs were made to give players new Build/Buy and CAS content without the need of an expansion and half the price of it. In The Sims 4, they were 1/4 of the price of an expansion, but also brought new gameplay experiences, like new interactive objects, new skills, new careers. The last Stuff Pack released was Paranormal, in January 2021, and EA never said if they are officially discontinued or if we'll get any other stuff pack.

Gameplay Kits EA introduced Kits in 2021, as a new type of paid content, being half the price of a Stuff Pack and focused in a single aspect: gameplay, CAS or Build/Buy. Bust The Dust was the only gameplay kit ever released. Seems like these were abandoned due to budget limitations, as you can't make much of a gameplay for a so low-priced DLC. Also, BTD release was a mess, there were several bugs on it and there are some that still persist nowadays.

Achievements The game has some achievements for the player, which are based in their current save. Achievements are unlocked when you reach specific goals (Career, Player Feats, Sim Feats, Relationships, Skills and Crafting, Wealth and Collecting). If you play on console, achievements are disabled if you use some cheats, like testingcheats and motherlode, because they count to their trophy/game achievements system. Most of them are from base game, and a few were sporadically added with packs, with the last achievement being from Seasons.

Handedness Sims are randomly assigned as left-handed or right-handed, but only few interactions (eating, drinking, holding some objects) respect the Sim's dominant hand.

Auto-save feature In The Sims 4 release, the game came with an auto-save feature, that often made a save state of your current save. The main drawback of it was that you couldn't customize it, like setting the period of each save. It also only saved in specific situations (creating a new game, when you made a manual save, exiting the game without saving and going to main menu without saving) and it didn't load on the Resume button, you had to manually choose it. They removed the feature in 2017, saying that "it didn't work as intended" but they didn't even tried to improve it

Snowy Escape removed content During Snowy Escape early access, some Korean players complained to EA about the "Bow at Shrine" interaction and some clothes that had Japan's imperial flag, since these were offensive to them due to the period Korea was over Japan's domain. These things were removed, although the interaction is still in the game's files and can be enabled by using a mod. There was also a new roof trim available in the early access, but it was removed due to alleged "technical issues".

In-game events The Sims 4 had many in-game limited time events, where you had to accomplish some goals to receive a reward, mostly special objects. There was even a hostess for these events, called Jasmine Holiday. There was also an event where a Sim version of Millie Bobby Brown was in this role.

Sims Sessions (as an in-game event) They kinda resurrected in-game events with Sims Sessions in 2021, where Sims of real-life artists made a presentation in-game in special venues, with some objects and clothing made for this event. It only happened once, and now this name is used for a YouTube series where artists show the making of their songs in Simlish.

Lifestyles These were introduced with Snowy Escape. Sims can gain lifestyles after doing some specific interactions along their routine. When a lifestyle is unlocked, these might have skill boosts, moodlet boosts, career performance boosts or even unlock special interactions related to the activities on the lifestyle. Your Sim is only allowed to have 3 lifestyles simultaneously and some of them are incompatible. No new lifestyles were introduced after that, although Growing Together's Social Compatibility is also affected by the lifestyles your Sims might have.

Pack refreshes After doing some surveys about introducing new features to already released content, EA introduced pack refreshes in 2021. The only pack that had it was Spa Day, with new interactions, new CAS content, new aspirations and a new trait. When people asked producers about new refreshes, the gurus refused to say anything about them.

Curved walls Introduced in the patch prior to High School Years, curved walls were a highly requested feature for builders, but poorly executed. Only a few specific windows and doors are compatible with curved walls, there's a bug with placing curved walls over other surfaces which causes the distortion of the surface under the wall, the object placement inside curved rooms is broken and the camera bounces if you do a curved room above the ground level. Additionally, no curved windows and doors were released besides the ones in High School Years.

The Sims 4 Gallery official app for mobile phones in this app, you could see and favorite created content, send them to download in your game and follow your favorite creators. The app was discontinued and removed from the app stores in 2017.

Scenarios (likely) Added as a way to give more challenge to the game, scenarios make the player accomplish some goals, in change of aspiration points, traits or unlockable assets. Some scenarios have a time limit to be finished, or you'll fail on them. Most scenarios are permanent, but there were some that were available to start for some real-life time and then vanished. EA even made a Main Menu overhaul to give more space to scenarios and even overhauled some of them, adding/adjusting difficulty levels and allowed some of them to be played with already played households. No new scenarios were introduced in 2023.

SDX (Sims Delivery Express) [likely] These were introduced as a way to add small contents to game without needing to do a full update for it, like new objects, new foods, new CAS content and small bug fixes. They were stored in the user's game folder. All these contents would later be introduced definitely in the game files with the subsequent game patches. No new SDXs were introduced in 2023, although the April 18th patch had content that were internally labeled as SDX contents.

Naked interactions for teens With Get Together, it was introduced the "Get Naked" interaction, alongside with skinny-dipping. Teens were enabled to do these interactions, but after a year or so EA quietly removed it from the game.

My Wedding Stories unfinished content We all know that My Wedding Stories' release was a hot mess. Several bugs, delayed release, issues with LGBT+ content in Russia... This pack development was so rushed that some features were left unfinished. You can ask for your valentine's parents for their blessing for marriage, but the game gives no moodlets related to them. A modder found that Maxis made the icons for the moodlets, but not the moodlets themselves. There is also a cross-pack feature with Cats and Dogs, where you can pick your dog as a flower pal, but it's only available using cheats or a mod to permanently unlock it.

Whims vs. Wants EA replaced whims with wants, and also introduced the fears system. The main issue is that cross-pack whims were not converted to wants, and the fears system seems to be very broken, being assigned to your Sim randomly and even repeating after solving it.

PlantSims These were released in The Sims 4 as part of one of those in-game limited time events, with some special powers related to gardening, Water motive instead of Bladder and their Hunger need can be fulfilled by sunlight exposure. They were also reused in a game scenario called Plant-A-Sim. Although they exist in game, they are not treated as proper occults, being labeled by the game as "temporary states", since their existence is basically a moodlet. Occult players begged EA to turn them into proper occults, but nothng was made.

Things Maxis said that would take time, but none/few updates were given:

Townie overhaul Maxis said that they would overhaul all the townies from the game, from Base Game to Cottage Living, giving them appearances with fidelity to their ethnics and proper lore around them. The only household which received a overhaul were The Goths, and no other was released after that.

Pronouns After many months speaking about them, the custom pronoun feature was introduced only in English, with no expected release for more languages.

[seriously-mike]

How The World Was Made Boringly Efficient

I have already reposted several posts about history under the tag #history was written by the Victorians, about the misconceptions that entered the public consciousness during the early modern era (mostly the Victorian age, indeed) and refuse to leave. That and, I promised a post about the modern perception of government and public services that just can't line up with fantasy worlds and, even, the ideas of some historians.

It hit me when in @milkywayan's post about medieval food, the typical idea of which is heavily tainted by Victorian ideas that, unsurprisingly, came from then-contemporary poverty food. And I really don't want to sound like Ted Kaczynski, but: blame the industrial society for that. And capitalism.

There will be a lot of things in this post that I copied from an unfinished draft of mine tentatively titled "Writing Fantasy in the Information Age" - mostly because back then I focused on the modern times entirely too much and a lot of the issues come from earlier eras. This is a general disclaimer for the tangents that will appear further on.

For the King and... That's It

The medieval (and earlier) concept of government was heavily personal, and with a lot of independence involved. I do remember, for example, scenes from the Asterix comics where the Roman governors did as they pleased and as long as their duties towards Rome were fulfilled (for example, paying the set taxes and pocketing much more for personal gain) they were left unbothered. The same can be said about patriotism, or more precisely the loyalty to the ruler, because the concepts of patriotism and nation as we understand it are Enlightenment-era ideas. And when I'm saying it was personal, it was personal. For example, the entire clusterfuck that was 17th century Poland started with the overly inflated ambitions of Swedish Prince Sigismund Vasa, a fanatical Catholic (oh shit) elected the king of Poland. His fanaticism caused us no end of trouble and wasted opportunities - for example, in order to hold the Swedish throne after his father Johan III died, he had to be forced to sign religious liberties for the local Protestants and never really gave up ideas of Catholic reconquista of Sweden, leading the regent, Sigismund's uncle Karl IX to oust him and take the throne, which led to over half a century of violent dynastic shin-kicking as both sides tried to take over the other without much success. Mostly because Sigismund refused to allow his son, prince Władysław, to change his faith for political reasons - neither to secure the Swedish throne nor, after we thoroughly kicked a lot of Muscovite ass, the throne of Russia. Just fucking imagine: we forced the Russian tsar Vassily Shuysky to pay homage to king Sigismund and accept prince Władysław as the new tsar only for the king to go "lol, nope" and scuttle the whole plan. All that despite two centuries and a half of wide-ranging religious tolerance introduced by king Casimir the Great and reinforced by various acts throughout the reign of the Jagiellonian dynasty.

And since we're at the 17th century clusterfuck, there's the issue of Cossack ataman Bohdan Khmelnytsky, who caused us a lot of trouble because nobody gave a shit about his personal feud with noble Daniel Czapliński. Basically, Czapliński stole part of Khmelnytsky's land, Khmelnytsky filed complaints to everyone higher and higher up culminating in an audience with the king, and achieved fuck-all. Much like a lot of people trying to get any help from the Polish government ever since. Worse yet, he was given a lot of shit for being that old-school Ruthenian Orthodox Cossack with a stupid haircut, mostly from the local prince Jeremi Wiśniowiecki, who was as much of a Polish Catholic poser as he could be. So, unfortunately, Khmelnytsky made some hasty and truly weird alliances, started a war and lost it, much like a lot of neglected Cossack leaders before and after him. Neglected, you ask? Well, I told you it was personal: the local nobles weren't willing to accept the Cossack leaders as people of equal standing, for various reasons, and treated them like uppity peasants.

And as for filing complaints to the King, we don't have the greatest track record about that either - for example, @bizarrepotpourri cited an example from the 15th century chronicle of Jan Długosz, regarding robber knights in southern Poland, that apparently never saw a resolution, as the stories of supposed punishment have multiple contradicting versions that don't line up with any records and sound like a smear campaign orchestrated by a rival noble family that was unsuccessfully tempted into treason by the Hungarians.

So, don't be surprised by all the free-for-all fuckery that goes on in A Song of Ice and Fire, for example. GRRM, while being laughably inept in some fields and rude and unreasonable about others, nailed the ambitions and liberties medieval nobles had, the way kings had to rely on the nobles by bribing and threatening them when necessary, and not really giving a shit as long as the internal conflicts didn't threaten the Royal house. Also, back to the elevator pitch for this post, and the quote by historian David Sturdy, don't expect the peasants to feel much loyalty to the land or country - they obey their local noble, and the king just in case, but apart from that they'll focus on defending their heimat - mostly their village and some lands around it, and if dragged into a bigger conflict by their liege (whether on the orders of the king or because of some dick-measuring contest against the neighboring noble), they'll be fairly confused about the whole thing. Forget the enthusiastic cries of "For Temeria!" from The Witcher 3 and other nonsense like that. They're more likely to raise torches and pitchforks against unjust taxes and services forced on them.

Guards! Guards! ...Guards?

While the concept of a Guild of Thieves as some kind of organized crime in the fantasy city of your choice is farfetched, don't expect any serious police force either. The city guard was usually tasked with manning the city gates and towers, also for fire watch duties, and, as I read in a book fragment helpfully photographed by @jurian-is-cinnamon-roll, the enforcement of some decency laws fell directly on the local executioner - for example, a too deep cleavage could get you a whipping. The judiciary role was fulfilled mostly by the city's government (unless some Serious Shit happened, as that required the appeal to the next instance higher up) and, unsurprisingly, the guards were often used as the Group In Charge's personal enforcers as well, meaning they were widely disliked and corrupt as fuck. So, getting caught by the onlookers and dragged to the nearest guard in the name of public safety was as or even more likely than being seized by the conveniently close patrol.

Another very important issue related to the city guards is that there was no municipal lighting to speak of - as in, no street lights, meaning that after sunset, the whole city was pitch-ass dark and you had to bring your own lamps and/or hire servants (called link-boys) to do it for you. And even then, with understaffed and corrupt city guard, you risked getting robbed by gangs of thugs.

Out of the cities, it was even worse: with the traffic few and far between, because not really that many goods had to be shipped long way away, there was nobody to come to your aid on the long stretches of roads, particularly through uninhabited terrain like all the vast woodlands or bare, rocky areas. Typical robbers weren't the Merry Men of Sherwood, but brutal thugs if not outright homicidal maniacs. Sometimes even minor nobles, particularly in German states, supplemented the income from their fiefs by ambushing trade caravans, at least until they became too much of a nuisance and had, for a lack of a better word, a posse sent after them. Then, there were pirates - while a lot of the current pop culture focuses on the late 17th-early 18th "Golden Age of Piracy" on the Atlantic, there are also the earlier North Sea pirates preying on the Hanseatic ships in the 14th century and Barbary Pirates operating on the Mediterranean Sea for over a millenium - from the 8th to the 19th century.

Million Ways to Die in the Medieval Times, A Lot of Them Embarrassing

I once said jokingly that “in Bismarck’s time, they made a lot of babies in the countryside because they wore out quickly”, a reference to many infant and child deaths that unsurprisingly skewed the statistics and led to the “barely anyone lived past 30 in the Middle Ages” myth.  Sure, there’s five centuries between Middle Ages and the Iron Chancellor, but as opposed to other things mentioned before, we had to wait for the important changes in the field of medicine all the way to late 20th century. Here's a page from a 17th century document listing the number of deaths in London, 1632 AD.

So, what was I saying about "making a lot of babies because they wore out quickly"? Over two thousand dead babies that year in London alone, not counting stillborn ones. Almost 1800 cases of tuberculosis, an illness pretty much unheard of in the modern world because we vaccinated the ever-coughing shit out of it. Over a thousand cases of fever, over half a thousand cases of pox and almost as many deaths by the notoriously neglected British teeth (read: abscesses, infections, inflammations, etcetera). In a city of about 250 thousand inhabitants.

Of course, any medical help was entirely private, small-scale and fully paid for by the patient - be it actual physicians, resident or itinerant barbers, herbalists or whoever had any medical knowledge or at least conviction of it. There was also a lot of mad science and outright quackery going on, not to mention treason - I do recall a case where the court physician of a Pomeranian duke was executed because somehow, strangely, the duchess' every pregnancy ended in stillbirth - until it was found out that he conspired with the neighboring state (I can't remember whether it was Denmark or one of the German states that had their distinct identities back then) to prevent the duke from siring a legitimate heir.

There were also no hospitals to speak of - what was called a "hospital" was, in fact, an almshouse - part asylum, part housing for the poor and elderly who had to express their gratitude by praying daily for the almshouse's founder good health and fortune. This also means that monks running those places didn't necessarily have any medical knowledge to speak of.

And since we're at embarrassing deaths, let's go back to the previous sections that regarded justice and law enforcement. You're probably thinking that in the Middle Ages, the lawmakers were going out of their way to have people hanged for just about anything and, well... that's bullshit. Not quite Victorian bullshit, as the stereotypical harsh law dubbed the "Bloody Code" was introduced during the reign of king George III - you know, the crazy one - although it has been entirely the doing of the British parliamentarians taking it out on the poor, as they're wont to do even now. While earlier penal codes like the Holy Roman Empire's Constitutio Criminalis Carolina did warrant the death penalty for grand theft, they also defined fairly high value of the stolen items - if I remember correctly, one golden ducat. The Bloody Code, however, aimed at a value about twenty times lower, and that would be 12 pence, or one shilling. Even with over two centuries of gradual depreciation of coin, that value was bubkes, and so the juries often undervalued the stolen goods, as not to hang everyone dragged before the court. For example, a sheep that was worth six shillings could be valued at ten pence, just so the thief could be hauled off to Australia instead and get pressed to work there. And while I know that other Tumblr users know the subject better than me, I learned long ago that being hanged was indeed embarrassing, certainly much more than having your head chopped off in public.

But, a lot of punishments weren't meant to be an embarrassing death or even maiming - if you ever saw the device known as the stocks, that one was meant mostly for embarrassment. Not only you had to be locked in them for several days, but also everyone around knew you and could give you a couple of harsh words or rotten produce. So your reputation was most probably dragged through the worst kind of shit by that, and if you kept going at it, you could be chased out of the area with the promise of a very embarrassing death if you returned, or just skip that and die a very embarrassing death. There were also other creative devices that made your life hard and made you look stupid, but I think I should leave that for some other time.

Mostly Rural and All-Natural

Now, let's focus on the post that started it all: the food. The Victorian age is well past the time when the majority of people started moving to cities, meaning that a lot of stuff had price tags and not many people could actually grow their own food. The Middle Ages, well, they were mostly rural and all-natural, like the title of this section says. This meant that, as the post about the food mentioned, people not only had a well-rounded diet that included eggs, milk and cheese, but also a large variety of vegetables and herbs, plus a lot of stuff found or caught in the wild - now, while venison and boar were the meat of kings and you would be royally fucked up for poaching those, nobody was particularly bothered about hares, for example. Also, when it came to clothing, homespun wool and linen were common materials and they could be dyed using various plants growing in the wild. The little display I linked should give you an idea of what was possible - and what, unsurprisingly, people refuse to acknowledge due to historical misconceptions.

This, of course, doesn't cover a lot of sumptuary laws that were common through history (and moreso in the Far East, particularly Japan). For example, the Ancient Romans had strict regulations as to who was allowed to wear silk clothing and clothing that was dyed purple, and multiple sumptuary laws in medieval Europe regulated the permission to wear certain furs, most importantly ermine that is now archetypical of royalty, and the amount of precious metals. So don't be surprised at the story I mentioned in the post about medieval executioners: I'm guessing that sumptuary laws were the reason why the infamously flamboyant clothes of a corrupt guildmaster were off-limits to the executioner who would be permitted to take them otherwise.

And Then What?

Okay, let's finish this. What's the deal with "boringly efficient" of the title? Well, for starters: the urbanization, industrialization and flight to cities that led to the simplification and unification of clothing, food etc. through large-scale production. That moved the burden of making clothes or growing food from single families to large enterprises, but also changed the whole structure of people's diets due to logistics. Our vegetables aren't the medieval vegetables, our dairy is not the medieval dairy and most importantly, our meat isn't the medieval meat, for better (no parasites like tapeworms) or worse (being pumped full of veterinary medicine, water and salts, for example). We also have access to incomparably more fabrics and dyes due to the progress of chemistry and textile industry. But still, those things are produced elsewhere, by someone else, and most of us just have to buy the same standard stuff from the store instead of creating bespoke outfits or at least hiring someone skilled to do it. Boring, right?

While luxury imports were well known since the ancient times, the formation of trading companies that at one point could rival governments and noble houses in their power did increase the range and volume of imports, and colonization of far-off regions also added a thing or two to that. And with the increase of volume, the prices tend to drop, so a lot of extraordinary stuff like all the exotic spices, now being grown in large-scale plantations, became boring. I mean, I can have cinnamon any day now - a lot of medieval nobles would die of bloody flux at the sight of such impertinent flamboyance.

Then, there's politics and sociology running forward full-blast ever since the late 18th century. The Enlightenment redefined a lot of fundamentals, like the concept of a nation divorced (or sometimes widowed) from the reigning monarch and his lineage. The necessity to include first the bourgeoisie and later even the peasants' representation in the government also required surveillance and maintaining order among them instead of just, well, keeping them around and sending the troops to beat the shit out of them if they became unruly. Hence the development of modern police forces, intelligence agencies and, on the other hand, social services to make sure the poor aren't wallowing in desperation and lawlessness (mostly). So most of the time, everything is peaceful and boring. Of course, there's still exploitation going on, but fortunately nowhere near the scale that caused large-scale uprisings in the medieval times (unless some government spectacularly fucks up and causes nationwide riots, which happened even in post-WW2 Europe) - mostly because of the necessity of representation I mentioned above.

Also, governments need people alive and working to pay taxes and, sometimes, wage wars. So they can't just ignore epidemics, dishonest food companies causing mass food poisoning by cutting costs, etcetera. Hence the rapid progress of medicine and incomparably more chill approach to law and its enforcement (mostly). Hard to believe the Medieval times were way crazier, right?

[sylviegunpla]

Gunpla: Completed Collection of Minis: Part 4: Gundam SEED

Next is the SEED Figures. These guys will have a lot of cockpit shots because i already finished off most of their models (though a couple of them were back before i was doing water slides, and just using the decal-stickers and dry-rubs that came with most non-ver-ka MGs)

PG Astray Red Frame: Lowe Gule

This was done before i had access to my magnifying binoculars. The panel lining was actually done with gundam panel line marker, over Mr. Super Clear Gloss. This kinda turned out well. However, his "brother" (the pilot figurine) wasn't so lucky: (under the cut)

This one i started panel lining, then messed up and erased, and it wound up not coming off right. So i just didn't bother and went ahead and finished it with a flat coat, no nuln oil for detailing or anything. BTW, the way i captured that backshot gives me an idea for what i could do with suit-less pilots.... but i'll leave that for another day. Anyway, i actually already water slide decaled his suit, so i could take pictures of him in the cockpit!

Oops, got a little carried away there.

moving on...

MG Strike Rouge + Ootori: Cagalli Yula Athha

This was THE first figure i tried nuln oil on. However, it turned out kinda messy, because it was a tutorial my friend was showing me. HOWEVER HOWEVER, i managed to recover it without too much work! I think she looks decent overall.

The pilot figurine was also finished with Nuln Oil, but after i knew what i was doing. I think she turned out a bit better.

Next, we're gonna go behind the scenes and see some of the movie magic i use to make it seem like these guys are in fully constructed models (I already tricked you with the post about the Hi-nu!)

Some basic shots showing the cockpit hatch structure.

And now you can't tell again that it's not complete!

The hatch is now closed. We move onto another pink gundam:

MG Infinite Justice: Athrun Zala

I finished him with only a little bit of panel liner, down the middle of his chest, and nuln oil on the face. A little blobby/messy but still achieves a decent effect from afar.

Here's the pilot figurine. No backshot because i pretty much left his back unfinished. You have to constantly change the thing holding the figure in order to paint certain sections and i was getting tired of trying to do the back.

His cockpit operates very simply, so i only have a few shots:

Yup, there he is. He's actually mostly fully built because i had to detach him from the sick ass plane he normally hangs from. Yes, the mecha suit i mean hangs from a plane. It's so sick, i'll have pictures in another post dedicates to this kit.

BONUS: So, for a while, i had this figurine that i THOUGHT was the pilot figurine for this kit. But then one day i opened up the cockpit hatch and saw the figurine. So who is this guy? what kit does he come from? I'm not even sure if it comes from a PG (1/60) or an MG (1/100), it seems closer in size to the PGs though. You can see i attempted to start painting it in Athrun Zala colors. I actually finished it but it looked so weird trying to force the sculpt to match the image. My friend thinks the sculpt looks like it could be a specific pilot outfit that Kira Yamato wears. It's equally likely it might be a Mu from a PG Sky Grasper. Can anyone positively identify the kit this figurine comes from? The few possibilities we think it might be are kits my friend used to have, but lost due to Moving Shenanigans. so we cannot confirm that those kits are missing pilots. ANyway, moving on, to the final figures:

2x RG Strike Freedom: Kira Yamato

Why do i have two of these guys? Because i have two of the kits! The Strike Freedom was the first RG I assembled, in 2020. In 2021, i got P-Bandai's "Titanium Finish" release of the exact same kit. Thus, i had two Kira Yamatos to paint. These both were painted in my first run of minis in Fall 2023, and they are the last of such minis to be shown off here! I did not panel line them, hell you can tell that getting the stripes on their tiny pilot suits was hard enough. They're very messy and have bad color separation. Honestly, i might try redoing one of them now that i have magnifying goggles. It would be worth it. And as a reminder, since these came with an RG, they are 1/144 scale, so a bit tinier than most of the others i've shown off (which are 1/60 or 1/100).

I believe that does it for Part 4. I just barely had enough image slots for all these pictures, but sadly not enough for some "gags" i wanted to do. there would have been 3 more images in the set of 6 pictures of Lowe Gule boarding the Astray Red Frame, but i had to cut them for extra space. To read part 5, Click This Link!

[onewomancitadel]

I actually don't know how Herbert would've realised the threat the God Emperor was trying to prepare everybody for and I think in some way that threat built up for three books ends up being more threatening and speculative not having been written. Lol. The NON-CANONICAL sequels take the flattest most banal approach which - even if you were doing it ad hoc (and let's be real, outline or no outline, it was going to be ad hoc in some way) - don't making any fucking sense whatsoever. Like I can't even go into enough detail for how insulting they are (robots??? Super Saiyan kwisatz haderach?? Water worms? Please put me out of my misery. That saccharine ending for Paul???). It's a perfect example of something being better left 'unfinished', or at least with an open ending, but then again I cynically do not think it was about 'finishing' Dune.

'Dune' is already finished by Dune Messiah and maybe more optimistically Children of Dune. Paul's arc, at least, is finished. The sense of history in the series means that an open ending isn't even the wrong feeling for Chapterhouse Dune to conclude on; by that point the God Emperor is well gone and the third and last Atreides protagonist is finished with as well.

Sure, I've seen the sentiment he kept writing because he could, but I still enjoy the series and I don't think he was just putting out schlock. I do think he was sexually frustrated writing Heretics of Dune though. What the fuck was up with that one

If anything I would personally rate Chapterhouse Dune as probably my third favourite book in the series. I think Odrade's arc is much clearer and more challenging across Heretics/Chapterhouse than Leto II's, and I find more catharsis in that, although God Emperor of Dune is very good. But the point I am trying to work towards is that Paul, Leto II, and Odrade not seeing the conclusive end of the series - that is, in much the way we technically don't - as characters on the page ends up being sort of weirdly fitting for the series. And the silent threat is something I can't really personally figure out a way to deliver on that tension, and then you get into things like 'well was the God Emperor a good tyrant? Was that preparation justified?' in which case I think the more interesting answer is yesno and no.

Dune isn't a series I'm too ripped about not having had a seventh and final book (although like, on the creative side of things I think seeing it through is important, but I'm speaking personally as a reader) and I think it might be one of the very few cases where it's better that way. And at the very least what he did with the series was achieve three closed character arcs, which not all epic sci-fi/fantasy series can say they are able to - with different aims of course, particularly in the case of Dune, which is not precious about its cast.

[al-hekima-madara-blog]

Sorry if you've covered this before, but I'd like to hear your opinion.

I view Hashirama threatening suicide as a may of manipulating Madara at his most vunerable. Why did Madara offer that option instead of just asking him to kill Tobirama?

Hi anon! Ah so sorry anon, again an other ask I've left unfinished in my draft and it piled up with other stuffs...

Ok I think you refer to my Senju conspiracy theory 👽 the pb with my conspiracy is that it bases on nothing from the canon but me being petty.

Mmh to answer you I must start by saying I don't think that Hashirama is moved by bad intentions. He's not truly a manipulative type like Oroshimaru and Obito. But he's definitely cunning. He got emotional smartness to connect with people.

I won't put Hashirama in this category that the other guys I've mentioned. He truly wanted to make peace by building a village and he did the sacrifice he thought necessary to obtain it, just like his friend Madara did what need to be done to achieve his Infinite Tsukuyomi. The main source of disagreement between them is because they don't have the same value system.

Madara put honesty above everything else. That's a non-negotiable side of him. Hence why it took him so long to trust Hashirama, why he doesn't like people in his back. Literally your back is your most vulnerable side, you can't control what's going on behind you. You need to be radically authentic to deserve Madara's trust, which is quite difficult to achieve for any human being. I went a bit in details here

Hashirama put the collective above everything else. This is very well articulate in his will of fire. The concept of village is above everything including the people in it. It's a bit like someone promoting democracy while bombing other countries in the name of democracy. And he shows himself radically ready to destroy anyone coming to his ideology, kins included.

So to go back to your question about this moment. Madara giving choice to Hashirama is an act of kindness. He obviously want to take revenge on Tobirama, an eye for an eye, your brother for my brother. But in the same time he doesn't want his friend Hashirama to spiral down in the same despair he's going through when he lost his last family member. And it's something constant in Madara's character. Paradoxically, he is the most destructive shinobi during the 4th war but shows also restrains and mercy.

"Who will go full force against children"

"I was showing compassion because you're a jinshuuriki"

that's the whole ambiguity about him: actively working for world peace while creating more war in the process.

[cleverwordsandotherstuffilike]

In April 2016, Patton Oswalt's wife, Michelle McNamara passed away suddenly in her sleep. She was 46, and they had been married for 11 years.

Since then, Oswalt's comedy career has been on pause while he grieves, takes care of their daughter, and, remarkably, helps finish his wife's last book (I’ll Be Gone in the Dark), which was left nearly complete at the time of her death.

"Thanks for making depression look like the buzzing little bully it always was. Depression is the tallest kid in the 4th grade, dinging rubber bands off the back of your head and feeling safe on the playground, knowing that no teacher is coming to help you.

But grief? Grief is Jason Statham holding that 4th grade bully's head in a toilet and then fu**ing the teacher you've got a crush on in front of the class. Grief makes depression cower behind you and apologize for being such a di**.

If you spend 102 days completely focused on ONE thing you can achieve miracles. Make a film, write a novel, get MMA ripped, kick heroin, learn a language, travel around the world. Fall in love with someone. Get 'em to love you back.

But 102 days at the mercy of grief and loss feels like 102 years and you have sh** to show for it. You will not be physically healthier. You will not feel "wiser." You will not have 'closure.' You will not have 'perspective' or 'resilience' or 'a new sense of self.' You WILL have solid knowledge of fear, exhaustion and a new appreciation for the randomness and horror of the universe. And you'll also realize that 102 days is nothing but a warm-up for things to come."

"...You will have been shown new levels of humanity and grace and intelligence by your family and friends. They will show up for you, physically and emotionally, in ways which make you take careful note, and say to yourself, 'Make sure to try to do that for someone else someday.' Complete strangers will send you genuinely touching messages on Facebook and Twitter, or will somehow figure out your address to send you letters which you'll keep and re-read 'cause you can't believe how helpful they are. And, if you're a parent? You'll wish you were your kid's age, because the way they embrace despair and joy are at a purer level that you're going to have to reconnect with, to reach backwards through years of calcified cynicism and ironic detachment."

"… Michelle McNamara got yanked off the planet and out of life 102 days ago. She left behind an amazing unfinished book, about a horrific series of murders that everyone — including the retired homicide detectives she worked with — was sure she'd solve. The Golden State Killer. She gave him that name, in an article for Los Angeles Magazine. She was going to figure out the real name behind it.

She left Alice, her 7-year-old daughter. But not before putting the best parts of her into Alice, like beautiful music burned onto a CD and sent out into the void on a spaceship.And she left me. 102 days into this.I was face-down and frozen for weeks. It's 102 days later and I can confidently say I have reached a point where I'm crawling. Which, objectively, is an improvement.

Maybe 102 days later I'll be walking."

In April 2016, Patton Oswalt's wife, Michelle McNamara passed away suddenly in her sleep. She was 46, and they had been married for 11 years.

Since then, Oswalt's comedy career has been on pause while he grieves, takes care of their daughter, and, remarkably, helps finish his wife's last book, which was left nearly complete at the time of her death.

www.upworthy.com

Joseph DeAngelo was captured two years after her death.

[midnight-and-his-melodiverse]

Hmm... writing improvement progress post? (This starts in early 2017, aka my middle school days as a writer and goes up to the present day!)

Beacon City: Herobrine's Apprentice (2017, word count at time of unintentional abandonment: 4,142)

(This screenshot is from Chapter 6 of "Herobrine's Apprentice", and the whole story was written in a roleplay style!) This story wasn't SPECIFICALLY written by me, it was more like a collaboration between my middle school friends Dan and Gavin (who are referred to as Cloud and Draconic respectively), during those times in school where we'd sneakily open up the doc to write this story and called it "free time" even though we only did a bit of work before those sessions lol Cloud wrote the perspective of the characters: Herobrine, Tennoch, and Fox (Herobrine's sidekick in this story), Draconic wrote the perspective of the Starlight Pros (a group of butt-kicking enthusiastic mob hunters) and I wrote the perspective of Kilobyte, Nanobyte, and Luke, and together we united to craft the epic adventures that made up the mysterious story of Herobrine's Apprentice.

In terms of how I thought my writing skill was at the time: This document doesn't really showcase that because of the fact that this story was a group effort, but I think my writing was relatively decent here!

MARINE PIONEERS: WRATH OF THE DROWNED (2018, unfinished)

(Text if you can't see it: In his undersea base, Hayden gathered his items and walked down the stony Prismarine stairs down to the rail station that he had constructed days ago. Hayden pressed a button that dispensed a shiny, pristine minecart. He hopped in and the cart chugged down the network of rails towards his storage room. Suddenly, Hayden heard the moan of a Drowned. He pushed the minecart to go faster, then the Drowned jumped onto the top of the minecart. Hayden unsheathed his enchanted diamond sword and plunged it into the monster's chest. He pulled the sword out of the body then experience floated around him. "Yes! I got the Monster Hunter achievement!" Hayden said, as the gray rectangle reading the text: Monster Hunter appeared on the top right corner. 

Soon, Hayden reached the entrance of the storage room. He hopped out of the minecart and stepped on the familiar grainy texture of Granite blocks filling his floor. "Now what was I going to get? Oh wait, I know. My diamond armor!" Hayden said as he walked towards a chest labeled "Special Armor". "Ah, there we go!" He said as he rummaged through the chest and found his armor.)

This one doesn't really have a story behind it... It was yet another Minecraft story that I decided to write, but only got to the second paragraph before I guess I just abandoned it and left the words: "To Be Continued..." at the end of it lol In terms of how I thought my writing skill was at the time: God looking back, I was proud of this at the time. Though at least I think this was an improvement coming from "Herobrine's Apprentice" which was a group written story!

HUNTERS OF VAIRIEL (2019, unfinished)

Hooh boy, now we've gotten to the point where I tried my hand at writing a fantasy thing...

In terms of how I thought my writing skill was at the time: Well... this one was certainly something, but I feel like you could see my descriptive side trying to emerge!

And now we come to the most recent!!

STARS, BITS, AND BYTES (2022, in progress!)

[hiriajuu-suffering]

Guru Pathik's 7 Chakra Exercise

ATLA is a series that speaks to our sensibilities on life, as well as one of the best coming-of-age stories to be released this century. To help myself, I thought I'd write-up the same process Aang underwent when he opened his chakras for personal growth and self-evaluation.

What am I afraid of?

Failure brought on by a lack of progress. That this point in life will never pass and I will continue to leave things unfinished. I couldn't stay at my first high school. My foreign language requirements kept lingering. I never finished my high school career. I had to take a gap year and go to a different school. I keep getting course incompletes. I struggle to find the motivation to acquire career certifications. It takes me too long to get over anyone. I've been in a stable relationship for years but still haven't gotten engaged. Always made to feel like I'm incapable, when it has more to do with being unwillingly unable. I want to let things flow, but I forget I once knew how to.

Pathik: you are still human, and humans make mistakes, stumble, and fall. When you trip in life doesn't define you, how you get up does.

I failed to meet my potential. My grades never aligned with my intelligence. I could've done more. I don't deserve love if I can't take pride in myself. All I do is let others down.

Pathik: if you let the image you have of yourself be defined by the people around you and your environment, rather than your own actions and character, you let results become your meaning rather than your intentions. You have had many opportunities to be an average, maybe even horrible, person, but you must remember you always chose the highest ground available to you. A lack of success does not mean a lack of good. You are allowed to be happy even though you aren't perfect. You are not a bad person for failing, you become a bad person when you stop learning from failure and let it fester into hate.

What are my biggest disappointments in myself?

I'm never who I set out to be. I was never a good enough son or brother. I didn't make 1st band. I couldn't go past the tipping point to fully dominate as an individual debater. My talent couldn't offset my look being unmarketable to make it in the recording industry. I could never win enough in card games to garner respect. Seeing anyone as worthy of trust became impossible for me. All I will ever get is rejection, within my control or not.

Pathik: Letting your failures undermine your zeal for life is a fallacy. While you experience failure, you still continue you to try to push to achieve something because you never truly fall out of love with the process. Music, Debate, card games are still crucial parts of your life you fall back on: while you have become shy with your talents, converting them into half-effort karaoke, panels, and dulling your edges, you stop committing to yourself. The same is true with the work you need to finish, you always hold out hope you will succeed but you remain too afraid to try to. The first three chakras balance your id, ego, and superego, the three have become warped in the same lamentations. Whatever you do, do your best to not be paralyzed by the changing current, afraid of getting hurt. You must take the risks to obtain something worthwhile.

My grandfather. The only reason I know what a sense of family and community is was my grandfather. I met someone who gave me that same sense of naturalism but she passed on as well. Then my aunt, the final person who was always in my corner left this world again and the isolation from the pandemic hit especially hard for that reason.

Pathik: their love isn't gone, it just takes time for people to convey love to you the more damaged and twisted up inside you have become. Loss and betrayal have become your familiar feelings where security, comfort, and belonging should be. You must remember you are never alone. Even though you may not feel the love reaching you is all that deep, there are still people who would mourn you. Your family would miss you, there are still people that both need, want, and pray for your survival. Part of your identity is your ability to unify, you have never shied away from this responsibility. Whether people say it or not, people do appreciate you for carrying their spirits as a part of your own and see you as valuable. You must be willing to accept love in order to commit to giving it back.

In what ways are you not speaking your truths?

My identity puts me into a place where my life is insignificant to those around me. Straight men of color are given the least compassion of any diaspora, being a member of the most slaughtered racial demographic and religious affiliation means my life is societally more dispensable than my white, female, or non-Christianized background counterparts. While it is a contributing factor as to why I get stifled, there's only so many times I can shake it off. I'm weary. Weary of vehemently androphobic women. Weary of the structural inequality in which the individuals a part of it are ignorant of their own white exceptionalism. Weary my labels on paper throw me into the model minority myth but I receive none of the privilege associated with it. Weary that of any random stranger, I would most often have the most contempt and bile directed at me, even if only implicit.

Pathik: you seek to control your identity in an era people want to assert themselves the most aggressively against their born identities. Asian-Americans and Hispanic-Americans continue to voluntarily whitewash because of a sense of self-hatred they were socialized with for being different. Accepting your difference isn't a weakness just as being cisgendered isn't a strength. Being secure in your expressions is something you ground yourself in, some in this world will attempt to taint the purity of that expression of the self. There is nothing wrong with accepting your own nature. You have a devotion to who you are in ways people can't reconcile, feel blessed you can. Coming off as lacking confidence in your identity to appease other minimizes yourself; you don't do so in front of students no matter how carefully your frame your rhetoric, why should you need to worry about appearing meek to adults to not intimidate them? Humility is not holding yourself back to make sure you never have a stronger trait than anyone else, humility is simply knowing you're no better than another person even though they have insecurities you may not.

I never really knew if my life was my own, Everyone always says anyone is capable of anything if they set their mind to it, but I stopped believing that a long time ago. I tried to convince myself it's because I didn't put forth enough effort and therefore didn't try hard enough even though I gave everything possible. Was I always meant to feel this drained? Living in reality constantly feels as if it comes with a tax, and I have too many dreams to make even an infinitesimal amount of them a reality. The choices I'm making are putting my wheels in motion, but it doesn't feel as if I'm actually going anywhere.

Pathik: at times, the pathway to enlightenment is so treacherously scenic, we often forget and lose parts of ourselves along the way. But to think the suppression of parts of oneself is a method to self-actualization is an illusion, folly of a great order. Humans often define themselves by trauma rather than events being defined by their character. Each action a person takes represents the image of themself they put out into the world. The paradox of life is we think we are defined by our actions and accomplishments when history is only made so by us living it. Everything is connected. Differences in the outcome of human action are only distinctions humans make for themselves, whether you succeeded or failed is not determined by a goal, but the process by which you learned. Life is just as much about the journey as it is the destination; without the journey, the destination is unearned. Even if it feels like you aren't making progress, to have faith is to believe the only constant in life is that change will happen, and to be at peace with that. Stoking change in your favor rather than fearing it is the manner in which you win fortune's favor because fortune favors the bold, not the stagnant. As long as you are doing something, you are achieving something, even if capitalism makes it seem otherwise.

What attaches me to this world?

The thought of making the home for myself I have yet to find, the partner that will care for as deeply or even more so than they care about themselves. Children I will love unconditionally and try my best to impart no expectations on even though they are my blood. Guru Laghima fully opened this chakra and was in complete harmony with his bending because he transcended his mortal coil and became one with air. There's a certain melancholy in knowing how to transcend, to feel alone of your own volition, no one truly grasping your sense of self. Yet, all I feel is pity for Laghima and Zaheer, especially upon P'Li's death. The gift of life is wasted on the living, and there's a particular nihilism that pairs with detachment. Connection to humanity is the meaning by which life becomes worth living. I fight for the sake of others, not to spite their objections. Balance only exists in conflict, not in the absence of it: all that does it bottle conflict up until surfaces. If change is the only constant, we will find new things to be attached to. That sense of novelty is why any singular earthly attachment and its absence aren't the answer. Cosmic power wants me to make deep and meaningful connections, not toss them aside. This is not muck in the swirls of energy within my soul, it is a dam I constructed myself that should only be broken upon death's doorstep. Otherwise, I lose sense of the world and become even more lost than before.

Pathik: in many ways, being attached to all is the same as being attached to none. Seeing value in every little thing, the tiniest components that help balance our world, is a means to connect to the universe, but it does force you to release the pool of energy you build up from time-to-time. Not only will you need a constant flow of new individuals and experiences in life, you will need an equally constant flow of individuals and experiences leaving your life, meaning happiness and sorrow will be at balance. Choosing to live in this strife isn't considered a noble choice within chakra manipulation, but is for a Muslim's relationship to creation. Depersonalizing consequentialism is the only real way for the creek to flow smoothly, but the absence of life indicates no change to the creek at all. Life can be tumultuous but finding peace in life is knowing no obstacle is truly bigger than you are if you get over yourself.

[chaeinedup]

Pretty please

You were tired. To be fair everyone was. A tour is a great achievement and it's super fun but it's also a lot of responsability, a lot of running around, some techinal difficulties that need to be fixed on the spot... It's just a LOT. And of course who knew that better than WEi themselves.

Excitment took over as soon as you knew you got to tag along, to be able to go to places you've never been before with some of your closest friends and your sweet boyfriend. Obviously you volunteered to help out in any way possible, you felt horrible just by the thought of becoming a dead weight. Sure this is leasure but you don't intend to push any boundaries it would be disrespectful to say the least.

But so far so good, putting aside all the stress of course, you couldn't have asked for better. Seeing them on stage was somehow very rewarding, even if you weren't apart of the official team, even if you don't work for them or with them, you've always admired how passionate and dedicated the guys were. And it translates on stage, it's crystal clear that they were born to be on stage.

Another day, another city, another killer show. Paired with amazing outfits, it's not like they're not always amazing but these are new ones. As in they will be wearing them to promote the b-side of their next album, but they decided to surprise RUi by performing it for them. Well them and you.

Daehyeon hadn't mentioned any of this to you, intentionally, because you're a RUi after all, but also his girlfriend. Your brain simply could not function once he stepped out of the changing room, the transparent mesh fabric was giving you a lot to think about. Everyone in the room could see your drooling, some laughed, some scoffed but you had completely blacked out.

After a good few seconds you came back to earth, realizing the man you so desired was looking at you with that smug face you so "hate". He didn't approach you, didn't talk to you, nothing. He was leaving you to suffer all alone, pretending he knows nothing. Typical Daehyeon.

One of the many perks of this tour is you had a room all to yourselves and that meant privacy for once. But with the shows Daehyeon was exhausted and when he wasn't he would decide to work on unfinished projects. There was always time for cuddling because he can't fall asleep without you in his arms, however that was it, which you're not complaining about but your body is. You crave him so bad and apart of you feels guilty about it, he's about to step on stage to finalize another successeful concert and you can't stop thinking about kissing him all over.

They went back up while you stood on the sidelines watching them give everything they got left. But someone looked renergized, like they hadn't just performed for a whole hour. He was enjoying your suffering while giving you the silence treatment and you know what that means. He only does this when he wants you to make the first move, he wants you to tell him you want him. That you need him.

Usually your dynamic consists of the "push and pull" which makes things very exciting and fun for the both of you, but given the fact you were completely blindsided there was no way you could win whatever was going on.

Ending ment came around which meant it was time to get things ready to leave, you made yourself busy trying to keep your mind distracted. As you were packing up their clothes someone pulled you out of the room, dragging you into the changing rooms.

"What are you doing?", your body was completely laid flat against the mirror, the cold surface making your skin tingle slightly.

"I don't know, what do you think I'm doing?" His words were smooth and seductive making you feel dizzy so much so you almost let out whimper. He noticed and decided to use it to his advantage.

"See, you can't lie to me, every part of you wants me as much as I want you."

"Daehyeon do you want to get caught??!!! Cause I don't!!"

"Then why are you pressing your thighs together, hmmm? Be a doll for me and turn around."

You didn't want to, merely for the sake of being a brat, but you couldn't deny you needed his touch. Arms around your waist, he was looking at you through the mirror, slowly making it's way to your hair placing it on your left side. He was so close to your ear you could hear him breath.

"Do you see that ?", his hands go down again to play with your nipples, "Do you want me?"

You let your head fall on his shoulder, making direct eye contact with him.

"Say pretty please."