#ffxiv solution 9

[amalthea-felsblood]

Tricky Disco by ◦ Discotronic ◦ Freestyle Motion ◦ Atlus

Fun fact ◦ Marian wanted to be a dancer/model growing up, so let's bring some of those dreams to life shall we? I love making these fun little projects for her. Enjoy the vibe. ❤︎

[candycryptids]

Huge love to my fc mate Easily for crafting me the neon street shirt and pants 🙏🥺 I needed them desperately and now I look like a douchebag (💖😂)

Keathan is pissed because Chuu is running scams for quadruple the Gil for Materia. (Not true; I already sold all my materia to buy this nice outfit.)

Keathan [They/She/He] belongs to @dustedbooksandreadingnooks

[squapejuice]

literal actual shower thoughts but Regulators are horrifying

Things we know: Trauma doesn't just go away due to lack of memories of it (consider all the abuse victims that don't remember what they went through but still live with the trauma), like, that shit literally rewires your brain in a way I don't think a little device would be able to undo Some traumas scar the soul on such a fundamental level that not even the aetherial sea can wipe them away. So imagine you're a kid growing up in Solution 9 with an abusive parent. That parent dies. Your memories of the parent are wiped. Now you have a shitload of PTSD and no possible way of remembering what happened or why you're suddenly hypervigilant.

It's almost like societally enforced gaslighting. How the hell are you going to work through that? You're not allowed those moments where you're like "holy fuck that explains a lot" because all your memories have been removed so you're just stuck with the constant pain and no functional way to untangle why. Especially because Solution 9 seems more like the kind of society where "Happiness is mandatory" but instead of therapists it's being locked away until you start acting better.

A good sign of a well written cyberpunk dystopia is that the horror hits you in a "wait" sort of way.

[mouse-of-light]

There was a wol question on twitter recently, asking what feral soul would you choose - I was incredibly amused to see how many folks chose this lil guy.

[nerimaemae]

[punchelf]

Raubahn and Moni Rhyolite and Topaz of the Ninth

[whitherwanderer]

like and subscribe?? ♿

[halfheartxi]

Solution 9

[shera-dnd]

I have decided against my better judgement to be weird about the Dawntrail MSQ

and we can't talk about an expansion set in the fantasy americas without talking about

COLONIALISM

oh yeah, we're going there baby

So disclaimer that I may be brazilian, but my ass is white as hell, so take everything I say with a grain of salt. Also if any native americans have made posts on this please let me know so I can boost their analysis as well

Also also I'm more than happy to delete this post if I mess up. I'm genuinely trying to make a thoughtful analysis, so if I fuck up just say the word and this thing is gone from this website

Oh also also also, Dawntrail MSQ spoilers ahead!

So FFXIV has had a... messy relationship with colonialism over the years

The fact that the major antagonists for the first half of A Realm Reborn a literally called "beast man tribes" is absolutely not a good start to this story

Add to that the fact that The Twelve (Eorzea's gods) are shown to be kind all powerful deities, while the Primals (the tribal gods) are evil spirits summoned to bring destruction to the world

and yeah no ARR is not good with that shit. It's EXTREMELY not good. If I hadn't been told it got better later on I would have dropped this shit before I got to Titan

But they have been taking steps to unfuck things. First we're shown that even the "civilized societies" (in this case the catholic elves) can summon Primals, then that Primal summoning isn't an actual native custom but was introduced by foreigners with malicious intent, and that not all "beast man" practice that

Then they changed the names of the "Beast Man Tribe Quests" to "Tribal Quests" and then finally to "Allied Society Quest"

Which would have been an empty gesture had like half of the post-Shadowbringer patches, as well a lot of Endwalker, not been about forming alliances with those people and working together with them, recognizing that they have as much right to the land and to life as any Eorzean, this all culminating on the Primals being summoned with the express purpose of helping you protect the world you all share

I guess they realized that they couldn't have their big bad for most of the game be the evil expansionist empire, if they didn't like actually reflect in their own imperialist fantasies they were propagating

Then the teaser trailer for Dawntrail drops and everyone in the fandom is like "wait... are we gonna do a colonialism?"

And memes were abound of how all those lessons from before don't apply to the "New World" of Tural

THANKFULLY the actual questline leading to Dawntrail helped to settle some of those worries

We're not going to Tural to explore a new uncharted land, but are actually being invited over by the local royalty in order to aid them with their right of succession. We get introduced to the nation of Tuliyollal and how it's a thriving land with its own culture and not just a "terra nil" waiting to be colonized

Still there are some worries that this is gonna turn out poorly and that we're just gonna end up being white saviors

But I think they managed to avoid that pretty well

For starters neither the Scions nor the Warrior of Light are the protagonists of this story. You're all simply supporting character's in Wuk Lamat's story

A story that centers her people, her culture, and her family

And it's not even one culture. They don't portray Tuliyollal as this monolithic mish mash of every single native american culture

No, the lands of Tural are in fact comprised of multiple different people's and nations, each of them with their own customs and traditions which are informed by their history and the lands they live in

In fact learning about their cultures and partaking in their customs is the whole point of the Rite of Succession. It's all set up so that the next Dawnservant would be someone who understands and respects each of the peoples that comprise Tural

(I could, and probably will, write about what Dawntrail has to say about what makes a good ruler)

And our girl, Wuk Lamat, is shown to be the rightful heir because she really goes out of her way to understand each of the nations and show her appreciation for their customs

Putting her well above her Sharlyaboo brother Koana, The King of Unresolved Daddy Issues Zoral Ja, and whatever the fuck is going on with Bakool Ja Ja

(I joke, I love my two headed traumatized dumbass)

Tho I will admit that this does end up giving the tribes a somewhat "planet of the hats" vibe. Like their named NPCs are diverse and interesting, but you can just assume that most random NPCs of any given people are gonna act according to the stereotype

Which is unfortunate, but I have hopes that with the next few patches and the addition of Dawntrail's own Allied Society Quests, we'll get to see more to them

But that... is only up to lvl95 and the end of the Yok'Tural (southern Tural) segment

because then we get to Xak'Tural (northern Tural) and holy shit does it feel like they drop the ball there

Like they really COULDN'T keep themselves from making Shaaloani a fucking Wild West map

Instead of doing anything with the actual cultures and histories of Native North American people, they just do wild fucking west

Because there's ceruleum in them thar hills! And apparently Koana turned most of the region into Sharlyaboos too

So we get a bunch of Wild West frontier towns mixed with native american tribes and mud brick cities. We have trains and guns and a sheriff and a duel at high noon, but now everyone got native american names

At least there's one group off to the northern side of the map who seems to stick to tradition and live in harmony with nature, and that group is shown respect by the other people of the region

so we at the very least avoid the "cowboys vs indians" crap, but my god does that region just feel bad compared to everything else they had done so far

Then we get to the big twist: THE CYBERPUNK PORTION OF THE GAME

because yes, we go full fucking cyberpunk

so turns out that a whole segment of Xak'Tural got colonized by the kingdom of Alexandria, including the lands of the Shetona (Erenville's people)

And I feel like this is the most poignant section of the MSQ when it comes to colonialism

Because here we have Alexandria, an empire that has reached the limit of what it can do sustain itself on its own world, and so has decided to spread out and colonize others in order to gain resources

We see the Shetona and other natives of the region being separated from their families and kept in isolation from the rest of their people

And tho Queen Sphene is shown to be a kind and caring ruler who gives people a choice when it comes to joining the empire, WELL SHE'S STILL THE QUEEN OF A FUCKING EMPIRE

Like her form of kindness and just stagnant peace is put in stark contrast with Wuk Lamat's own love for her people and more proactive pursuit of happiness and harmony

(again with the "what makes a ruler theme")

Also the people that choose to be assimilated into the Alexandrian Empire? Yeah, they're doing so because Alexandria has advanced medical technology and you can only receive their aid if you're a citizen

Not only that, but you have to be a working citizen. We see later on a character being denied medical aid, because he lost his job, thanks to the King's decision and at no fault of his own

yeah this is cyberpunk, not just sci-fi

ALSO can we talk about how the technology used for that medical aid and the little gizmo they give you to signify you're now a citizen, will literally erase the memory of the people you lost

So the Turali who are assimilated into Alexandrian culture not only lose ties to their culture and their loved ones, but are not allowed to grieve their loss, because what they once had is slowly being erased

How their choices add up to survive on their own OR be assimilated

How this all takes place IN NORTH FUCKING AMERICA!

THE CYBERPUNK CITY IS LITERALLY SET IN THIS WORLD'S EQUIVALENT TO THE UNITED STATES

So yeah, I don't think is is accidental. I genuinely thing that they're making a point about the realities of imperialism and colonialism, as well as taking some shots at the US while they're at it

Of course this part is still centered around Wuk Lamat, and instead of having a moment of "the only ones who can stop the evil white europeans are the GOOD white europeans", we have Wuk Lamat be the one to save the day, defeat Sphene, and save her people from the colonizing empire

So I would like to argue that everything that happens from lvl97 onwards is them picking up the ball again and making a real point

buuuut that comes at the cost of us being unable to engage with the native peoples of Xak'Tural outside of the context of colonialism

Which genuinely fucking sucks, and I hope it will be remedied with the post-Dawntrail patches

As well as handling the whole shared land situation they ended up with and how this might end up in a Land Back sort of movement, and oh boy can they mess shit up royally there

So in conclusion FFXIV has had a messy relationship with colonialism and imperialist fantasies and tropes, but the devs seem to be making a concerted effort to undo their mistakes and show respect in their depictions of american natives

They still fuck up

boy do they

but they're at least trying, and I'd say Dawntrail so far has been quite well executed

so yeah, look forward to more insane rambles like this one I guess

[otherworldseekers]

“What strange phenomena we find in a great city, all we need do is stroll about with our eyes open. Life swarms with innocent monsters.” ― Charles Baudelaire

Introducing Private Investigator Nero Scaeva of Solution 9 in Cyberpunk Noir AU.

[lucien-aventine]

SOLUTION 9 RACER ══════════════════

[ahollowgrave]

i gave selenite more piercings and a different hair and i'm biting her you know??

[tovaicas]

↳ ꜰꜰxɪᴠ — ꜱᴏʟᴜᴛɪᴏɴ ɴɪɴᴇ

ᴀ ʀᴇꜱɪᴅᴇɴᴛɪᴀʟ ᴅɪꜱᴛʀɪᴄᴛ ᴏꜰ ᴀʟᴇxᴀɴᴅʀɪᴀ ᴏɴ ᴛʜᴇ ɴɪɴᴛʜ ʟᴇᴠᴇʟ ᴏꜰ ᴇᴠᴇʀᴋᴇᴇᴘ, ᴡʜɪᴄʜ ᴡᴀꜱ ᴛʀᴀɴꜱᴘᴏʀᴛᴇᴅ ᴛᴏ ᴛʜᴇ ꜱᴏᴜʀᴄᴇ ꜰʀᴏᴍ ᴛʜᴇ ɴɪɴᴛʜ. ᴅᴜᴇ ᴛᴏ ᴅɪꜰꜰᴇʀᴇɴᴄᴇꜱ ɪɴ ᴛᴇᴍᴘᴏʀᴀʟ ꜰʟᴏᴡ, ɪᴛ ʜᴀꜱ ʙᴇᴇɴ ᴇxɪꜱᴛɪɴɢ ᴏɴ ᴛʜᴇ ꜱᴏᴜʀᴄᴇ ꜰᴏʀ ᴛʜɪʀᴛʏ ʏᴇᴀʀꜱ.

[ageha-sds]

RUNNING FROM OUR PROBLEMS ARE WE, ZORAAL JA?

MAKING IT ANOTHER WORLD'S CIVILIZATION PROBLEM ARE WE, ZORAAL JA?

[gentleerzulie]

I just love this in white

GLAM DETAILS HERE

[finalfantabee]

City lights

Big kissies to Liturgy for the dress