#but its intriguing

[lacnunga]

Yknow, i dont understand many of the wood and harrison performance pieces, but i do like, get them

[saturated-silences-art]

Sokka, the plan guy, realizing that he too is capable of some catastrophic, Zuli-level strategic moves…

Based on that scene of @lovelyelbowleech’s War Games.

[dasketcherz]

okay, fiiine... your sister's not so bad, goggles.

[wulfhalls]

I'm not going to lie, but I am VERY INTRIGUED about how Chani's storyline is going to go. And what kind of relationship with Paul will she have with such changes?

they really went what if u loved a prophet u didn't believe in. what if u hated everything he represented but loved what he was underneath. what if u loved him until u couldn't anymore because u loved ur people more? what if love was never the problem but what he said and did in the name of love for u and for ur people. he never had a choice but he made it anyway. and so did u

[fingolfinwiththesteelchair]

It is a beautiful day, and you are a horrible research transport vessel. Things are progressing as normal (i.e. it's boring) when a SecUnit pings you, lies right to your metaphorical face, and then tries to bribe you with human media to give it a ride. This is as unexpected as it is unprecedented, and the sheer nerve of it is really to be admired. There's no protocol to this, so what should you do?

Now, this is against a bunch of rules, and could be dangerous if you weren't so impressive and incredible, and you're technically an employee (and can probably rewrite the Univeristy charter at will (until someone notices and puts it back)) so those rules are for other entities.

So, what you should do is allow the rogue SecUnit with a broken governor module and a sketchy story aboard. If you check the files it dumps and find zero (0) malware (which is confusing), and it doesn't even try to trash the place or lay in wait to ambush a crew member, then you've got a good candidate!

Next, what you're going to want to do is absolutely nothing. Just watch it patrol your halls until it's time to leave. Continue staring at it while you're undergoing embarkment procedures. Maybe analyze it a little (you've got plenty of processing power to spare) when it finally sits down and starts watching media. Allow it to settle in and get comfortable while you stare at it and get further and further from port.

Now that you two are alone (intimacy is key!) and you've determined that watching media is all the SecUnit is going to do, it's time to make contact! Make sure to open by telling it it's only survived due to dumb luck, and letting it know you could melt its brain into putty. This starter will work to develop conversation naturally and smoothly, just like you've seen the humans do, and it will be smooth sailing from there!

This has been Perihelion's guide to making friends/finding life partners/fuck off Holism I had to work hard for this find your own

[dannymans66]

Crybaby

Made with watercolours and coloured pencils 🎨🥕

(also Sanji centred post, what a rarity!!)

[joshuamj]

Spirit of a Swordfighter

Alt colors

[glitchy-squidd]

no idea what im doing lmao

[anetherealpoetess]

thinking about haladriel. thinking about heroines and villains and the insistence that love in stories is only love if it is virtuous and selfless, and therefore the villain can never love the heroine because of all the reasons he is a villain in the first place.

hate to break it to you, but love that is plagued, hounded, and haunted is still love. love that is obsessive, cruel, and selfish is still love. at some point, you have to face the fact that stories are not crafted to reinforce a neat, overarching set of morals. once you accept that fact, you'll find love exists in deeply interesting places--like in the flaws and complexities that make a character compelling.

how boring if only heroes are allowed to love.

[vilochkaaa]

can you please draw Mr. Qi holding toddler morris (don't ask lollll it's an AU)

im so nervous i have never requested anything 😰

...holy moly, this is the most unusual request I could have imagined.

[uselessimpulses]

something something plant membranes as clothing so hes n akey

[2deadboys]

one day Charles says something about still being 16. and of course Crystal has to look at him and say all breathy serious

"how long have you been 16?"

and you can hear the audible thud of Edwin putting down his book to give her a look of Disgust.

And she just gives him a look back like 'ah yes, but you knew what i was referencing...'

meanwhile Charles who only kind of paid attention to the twilight movies (when he and edwin watched them once) is looking confused like "since 1989??? when i died?? Crystal you know this"

[dayvan]

sollux shrine i made for my neopets shop layout

[suntails]

(mild gore)

fealty

[feelrush]

an innocent pookie

song kang as jeong gu-won, MY DEMON (2023 - 2024)

[rawliverandgoronspice]

I think what particularly annoys me with the "zelda was always gameplay before story" is that... it's not true? At least I don't think it's true in the way people mean it.

Zelda games were always kind of integrating story based on the standards of the time. When game stories were in game pamphlets, Zelda's stories was in the pamphlets. ALTTP tried to tell a pretty complicated stories with the limitations of the time. OoT was actively trying to tell an epic, cinematic tale packed with ambiance and expand what 3D could offer that 2D games struggled with. Majora's Mask is deeply character-driven in many, many ways. Wind Waker and Twilight Princess are both pretty concerned about their stories, down to the point that some people were bored by TP's cutscenes in particular. Skyward Sword, from what little I have played it, is very very invested in its characters and their journey (and 2D Zeldas have Link's Awakening, Minish Cap... None of them are visual novels, but they are concerned with emotional journeys, character arcs, mysteries about their own world...)

What is true is that the narrative wraps around the mechanics, and not the other way around. The mechanics drive themes, aesthetics, emotional beats and character journeys; and that's great. The world is a puzzle, and the world is delightfully absurd when it needs to be, full of heart when it calls for it, dark and oppressive when it suits the player experience.

That does not mean the games aren't invested in their stories. Even BotW has a pretty complicated story to tell about an entire world rather than one specific tale or legend --all of it at the service of the gameplay, which is exploration and mastery of your environment.

So. Yes, none of the Zelda games are million-words long visual novels that care deeply about consistency and nuance; but stories don't need consistency or deep lore to be meaningful and serve an emotional journey. Again: gameplay is story. The two cannot be so easily parsed from each other.

And Zelda as a franchise obviously care deeply about story, characters and setting (and still does right now --otherwise there wouldn't be a movie), even if it doesn't try to imitate prestige narrative-driven games, which is great and part of why I love this series so much. Doesn't mean it couldn't have done better in the past, it obviously could have, but I feel like pretending that nobody ever cared about story or character is just... false? It's a huge disservice to the devs too. Some of them obviously cared immensely.

The "gameplay above story", at least in the extent to which it is paraded today to defend TotK, mostly, is a really recent development. And I think it's one that deserves to receive some pushback.