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smurfettte · 7 years

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💎✖️️💕🍳🍭😂

DOTT IM SO SORRY I JUST SAW THIS TY

Im still using sm*rf bc i dont want it to show up in the tags its annoying and im sry

💎 - when and how did you discover your special interest?

Ooh this goes way back.

Well, when i was about nine my parents first seperated (they did twice, ultimately getting divorced 2nd time around) for a period of two years, and during that time we had very, very little money because my mom was a stay at home mom for years and had to get a job too, so we basically had to cut, like, everything/anything extra that we didnt need. The best my mom could do so we didnt get a total shock on top of everything was to get us the smallest cable package possible (im pretty sure it was way cheaper back then too, idk if even that would be manageable now) where we had just like, a little cluster of channels; one of those was boomerang. I was really, really sad about loosing cartoon network, so my mom hyped me up about being able to watch sm*rfs, even though i only had a very vague idea of what they were. From there, it kind of just became my permanent special interest. My mom and i watched it together a lot since her mom played into the really strange christian propaganda of “demonizing” cartoons that was everywhere in the 80s when she grew up. She would bribe her brother not to rat her out when she would sneak-watch it on saturday mornings and tbh that would literally be me

✖ - Is there something you Dont like about your special interest?

Definitely. The author of the original comics was uh… a really sexist, probably racist and a homophobic guy. Which, really shows in his earlier works – the full sm*rfette story is honestly much worse than the concepts of her origin that were kept in the cartoon. The 80s retelling is basically the comic but heavily censored for over obviously sexist content, while still being sexist in itself (just in a way where, maybe for younger viewers or a blind eye, its not obvious at first). Honestly just the treatment of most of the female characters is my complaint in the way a lot of them are portrayed, but especially sm*rfette. She cant do one self indulgent thing for herself without it being ridiculed or often portrayed as wrong, even when shes like the smartest and most caring person in the village. Its annoying and not a good message at all.

Also, it tries to be written as insanely het all the time and just isnt. Like its so gay and theres so many moments where youre like “ppl really tried to pass this as het…bitch” but time and time again… straight people think its reasonable that an entire village is attracted to. a single person (who most of the time heavily shys away from affection from men too, lmfao…). REALLY hoping the new movie addresses that in some way thats not bad, but im trying not to get my hopes up (ive got my hopes up).

💕 - Something you like about your Special Interest?

Honestly this is a lot of things, but i would have to say?? Like. Everything, except the things i dont like ^. Its constantly been such a comfort to me in so many ways. I love the characters, i love how it was my first real introduction to fairytale fantasy (aside from disney) and its just… so calming. Some people find it boring and annoying, but for me it was so easy to fall in love with and kept me company/calmed me down during some of the worst times ive ever had. Even when some of those worst times were because people would make fun of me for loving it.

🍳 - do you have a stim related to your special interest?

In a few ways, yea! I do!

I always compare it to this, but i think being surrounded in things related to it is a kind of visual stim that relates to the old woman who wants most everything in her house to be green. Just as it makes her feel calm, happy, and energetic, i have the same expirience but i sm*rf theme as many things as i can, and collect ALOT. I try to be surrounded by it as much as possible, and it always helps me to feel happy and calm. If im not in a space where its all around, i’ll have sm*rf things that i use day to day, like my wallet, cups, things like that. It always provides a feeling of happiness and safety.

Another for a physical stim is that i have a sm*rfette themed slime that one of my best friends made me for christmas! (He made a little white hat to put over the lid too, it was so sweet). Its a glittery blue, and has lots of gold, blue, and flower shaped sequins in it! i love squishing gooey and squeezable stuff. Textures like that are the best ever.

🍭- a headcanon/theory you have about your special interest?

This is gonna be long and im sorry i talk so much, but Brainy, Grouchy, Clumsy, and Fette (so i dont have to block out the full word again) are all autistic!

- Brainy expiriences a lack of empathy, tends to micromanage more than one usually would (especially if one of his special interests are involved/its something he came up with himself) and, as mentioned, expiriences special interests (a need for worldly knowledge – especially of magic, and for papa, who he constantly seeks to impress and be respected by, no matter what it takes. He loves him and wants to be just like him, and often does things for him out of the blue just so he’ll appreciate and recognize him + his potential). He stims by chewing (probably with the handle of a wand) and by writing + drawing swirly doodles on paper with his quill pen. He infodumps, and he usually lacks an understanding of social cues; this often leads to him making “bad decisions” being highly ridiculed, often overshadowed by his peers.

- Clumsy does not quickly process information + events, his comfort object(s) is/are his continuously growing rock collection/garden that he waters and talks to everyday, he stims by flapping and jumping, and is very uncoordinated. There are often ‘simple’ things that confuse him that he is unable to figure out quickly (like putting together things that fold up - chairs, foldable tables where u have to specifically press something, stuff like that. I think its an autistic thing even though im not able to describe it very well since ive struggled w it all my life myself and i always get weird looks when i cant do it) and his special interest is Brainy. Because he is physically incoordinated and processes information slow, though people do stick up for him, he can often recieve even worse treatment from those around him than Brainy does, on top of being easily able to manipulate due to him being so easily trusting and loving. Because of this, him and Brainy often do everything together, and eventually their mutual love for each other + relatability brings them to be almost inseperable (even if Brainy looses his patience more than he should sometimes). aka theyre boyfriends it rly shows

- Fette struggles with anxiety (as alot of autistic people, like myself, do) and has hyper-empathy. Similar to Clumsy, Fette seeks comfort in her flower garden and flowers in general, often holding conversations with them. This actually is a real theory, but she believes that talking to the flowers will help them to grow, and cherishes them as if they were people. She knows the name of every flower in the forest and could tell you at LEAST 5 facts about every single one. She stims by flapping, jumping, and chewing on her hair. Fette is quick to act to situations whether good or bad, and raised voices from others can often send her towards a meltdown (in where she retreats to her house for solitude to calm down + renergize). Though she loves her friends and being with them, she is an introvert and enjoys being by herself or with her flowers to regain energy.

- Grouchy uses echolalia to express his emotions and partake in conversations, while being mostly nonverbal. He often seeks company in animals or baby sm*rf (who i believe is also his special interest) because they bring him comfort and dont ask him to explain or change who he is. He is often very distant from most people, and only opens up to being around people he feels he can trust.

😂 - something funny about your special interest?

It just made me type up like. Disorganized paragraphs when im supposed to be packing up my shit 2 go to my moms. Also just the idea that a whole village could be attracted to a single person and no one else… funnie as shit my guy

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mobianstrip · 5 years

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sonic forces me to analyze the game

this is by no means a full, in depth review of sonic forces. however, since im working on a Forces au i think its only fitting to talk about my personal gripes with the game. just to be clear, i dont hate sonic forces by any means! there are some really neat concepts about it that i enjoy, which ill include my thoughts on as well! though with that said, theres a lot about it that could have been dealt with better. this post is gonna be a bit long and messy, sorry!

now i cant speak for what the gameplay controls itself are like since i havent actually played it with my own hands, so my primary focus will be the story and general format of the game. everything under the cut!

ill start by saying that in hindsight, i think the general premise of the game is actually really neat (had the war framing of the plot not been so overly glorified and bland. more on that below). eggman taking over most of the world is very reminiscent to the initial circumstance of mobius in the early archie sonic publication. it seems especially reflective of the comic in the fact that sonic forces takes place on a planet setting more akin to that of Mobius than that of Sonic’s World/Earth, the difference being the lack of human beings aside from Eggman. while this does somewhat bother me for the fact that it paints an inconsistency with the setting, im also all for the planet being strictly Mobians + Eggman again tbh. the concept of sonic being on earth populated by humans, complete with a mock version of the united states, never really settled well with me. it always felt like just a means to make sonic more relatable, which is true, but not done because it made anything more interesting. a problem that then arises is that the origins of shadow and silver/blaze would be radically different or at least would need some retcon alterations to make sense...but thats a topic for another day

overall, looking past the inconsistency with the setting and its implications, i enjoy how the premise of the game feels like going back to the basics. but even the premise still has its problems...which is never a good sign, and this point practically sealed forces’s fate of inconsistency: the theme of war and how it frames the story is so, so poorly written

starting with whats presented at the beginning of the game, sonic is captured by eggman as a prisoner. if the writing had just left it at that, fine. however, the exposition goes on to say that sonic has been there for six months being tortured...and that tails has completely lost it. again id be fine with this - the theme of war is a darker one so these two events would make sense in this circumstance. however, that tension is just totally lost in a matter of a few episodes. you rescue sonic who is just as cheery and jokey as ever, somehow able to fight a boss despite being supposedly locked away and tortured for six months

of course i understand that its not like they could give sonic ptsd and make him look tortured and weak and so on - but why even mention the torture thing at all? the same problem is apparent with the first cutscene with tails. tails is hardly given enough time to seem like he has "lost it". i will say though that tails WAS given a bit more of an emotional response to work with than sonic overall. particularly when tails is about to be attacked by chaos, and he ducks his head in fear and calls for sonic to help him even though sonic isnt there - i actually enjoyed this small segment bc it does reflect some of what was said about how he reacted to sonics capture (aside from also being across the planet...for seemingly no reason except bc he "lost it" and to get him away from the main group so that classic sonic can appear)

frankly speaking from these two points alone, the games tone just feels kind of confused. its obvious the writers wanted some parts of the darker theme of war...and its also obvious that going all out wasnt gonna be an option bc of the nature of sonic as a character and franchise being about more lighthearted, easier to relate to stories about sonics heroism. which im fine with that being the case; sonic is a hero and more importantly a mascot that profits off of kids being able to relate and look up to. my issue is simply that the premise of this game makes consistent writing kind of doomed from the start if the writers are trying to appeal to both the kids AND older fans. they cant go to the lengths necessary to adequately build the narrative. cant go too dark, cant go too lighthearted, and not finding a balance between to two gives you a confused and bland story

on that note, i personally find the theme of war to be...uncomfortably glorified and unchecked (adding to the tone confusion and blandness). sonic forces is named so because...yknow. armed forces. armies. the whole point of the game is that theres a war going on and youre on the good guy side. i mean its not as if youre fighting against other living creatures, just infinite and eggmans robots, but still. i think what put me off the most is the first comic with the soldier cat. after they save the day, the last lines are "I'll do better. I'll be better. I'll become a real soldier and a real hero." now slap that as the tagline to a united states army corps commercial and suddenly its really...sour tasting

war is just one of those subjects that i think needs to be handled with a bit more care. i mean think about it: the primary gimmick of forces is that you get to make your own character, to be the sonic version of yourself in this world. the plot of the game is that theres a war, and your character joins the resistance to defeat eggman. this game is pretty blatantly glorifying the idea that joining in on a war can make you a REAL soldier, a REAL hero. to some kids, that might sound pretty cool. but theres no nuance to it whatsoever, nothing thought provoking on the subject. no one steps back to be like ‘its good to do good things but wars are tough and not fun, and being a hero isnt everything’. none-a that

now do i think a sonic game could get it into a childs head that they should join the army for real? no, not necessarily. i think its possible, but i think that would also be due to a larger issue of military glorification present in modern culture in general (especially in america). mostly i just find the implications at play with glorifying the theme of war in conjunction to the avatar gimmick to be in poor taste and also entirely avoidable because...

i dont think the war and army framing even had to be a thing. not only is it just so sloppily done in general, with that fact that the supposed soldier forces on the Resistance side are literally never seen on screen except for some dialogue boxes in one episode and the rest of the time only being mentioned through other characters, but i seriously think never saying the words “war” or “army” and not including literal soldiers would have worked just as well and even been the better route. they could have just been like yeah heres eggman taking over the world, heres the resistance fighters that have come together to stop him, they are opposing forces and you play as your avatar to stop eggman - and just leave it at that. it wouldve made the glorification of war less obvious and the handling of the topics at hand appear less confused, appealing to a more lighthearted tone rather than weighing it down with frankly out of place hints to a darker subject of war

finally i wanna talk about the story as it relates to how its told through the game. the plot itself is fairly standard - eggman starts war, captures sonic, takes over planet. you rescue sonic, and together you fight eggman and infinite and ultimately defeat them. thats all good and well even if its cheesy sometimes. the REAL problem is how its executed. a lot of the exposition is given not through cutscenes, but through spoken dialogue with text box subtitles over the episode select screen. and it just feels so...stiff. it doesnt feel like world building, it just feels like being forcefed information with no substance behind it

i get that fully rendered cutscenes throughout can be expensive and time consuming, but shoot id take in-game rendered cut scenes at least. (like in sa, sa2, shadow 2005...) anything that could have provided the world building with a bit more ground to stand on would have been great. sure, there are levels to traverse which look cool...but they dont provide any sense of scale, they dont tell us what the area is like, and more importantly, you never see the other characters who are supposedly on the battlefield "alongside" you in a couple episodes. the storyline from the exposition along sounds like it could be an epic journey - but the way its told with the given game mechanics (i.e.: stage-based gameplay with no open worlds to explore) leaves a lot to be desired

i feel like the stuff explained in the comics should have just been cutscenes or exposition or something to pad out the game a bit. the comics are so short anyways so why just put it in the game? maybe not the first comic about the rando soldier saving the day or w/e...but the comic with silver and knuckles fighting chaos? the comic about infinites origins? all of that could have easily been included. at LEAST the comic with shadow was part of the DLC...but even thats just so gimmicky. they provide important background to the main plot of this game so i really dont understand why it was sidelined to comics and not just included from the beginning

the tension that the exposition already fails to build up is brought down even worse when coupled with the confusing timing of the stage complete screens, where you get your completion rank and see what new character creation items you unlocked. listen, i know immediate gratification for completing the level is important and all...but i swear, having these screens between the end of a boss fight and the cutscene showing what happens to them after being defeated seriously impairs the flow of the game. maybe having it there allows for the cutscene to load up in the background to improve efficiency, but personally id prefer seeing a loading screen as the break between a boss fight and the following cutscene after it and THEN the stage complete screen to finish the sequence off. the boss fight end cutscenes arent that long anyways for the most part, so its just nonsensical to have the stage complete screen interrupt the action when theres only a two minute scene left to it

i cant stand how streamlined forces is to the point of the main plot. what happened to games that actually take the time to explain stuff, show us extra bits to the story and how they connect? and even when forces' does explain SOME stuff, its through audio/text only dialogue. nothing visually interesting, just...dialogue. and then its off to the next level. forces' feels very bare bones honestly. the story is supposed to feel big and epic but it just wasnt given enough to bring that feeling into fruition. this is probably the only thing that saves forces’ from the war glorification issue because the game simply fails so miserably at telling a compelling story due to poor writing and poor formatting that the war stuff gets lost in the mix - and thats just sad

all of this brings me to my conclusion. fuck i wish sonic forces was a better written and executed game, because i do think it could have been so cool. i really like infinite as a villain, in both his design and personality. yeah hes kind of a whiny, edgy bitch - but he had potential. and its really gonna suck if this game killed off all that potential in one fell swoop

(then again, thats why we have fan content and aus :3)

#text

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