#imagine getting your gimmick copied

[gimmick-copier]

hey. you should copy @mass-reblogger 's gimmick

ok

[zedecksiew]

TO PUT AWAY A SWORD

David Blandy + Daniel Locke's post-apocalyptic hopepunk TTRPG ECO MOFOS is back from the printers. Meaning it will soon be in our hands.

Am fairly hyped for it, because I wrote an adventure!

To Put Away A Sword is about the woes of building a home on poisoned earth. The terrible powers that hurtled us to the end of the world continue to bear bitter fruit in your garden.

You are villagers living under the shadow of a fallen giant mecha. Its reactors and warheads leak into your groundwater, poison your goats. What will you do about it? What can you do?

+

Mechanically it is a pointcrawl around your local valley. Not super complex, design-wise; but I was pleased with my gimmick solution for mapping both the adventure's dungeons:

Grab a mecha figure, pose it, place it on the game table; each part of the figure corresponds to a location in the dungeon key. Solves for stuff like relative orientation.

Easy!

+

To Put Away A Sword is me making a mecha adventure.

Disclaimer: I am not a mecha nerd. I am unfamiliar with most of the genre. Anything I know about Gundam I've absorbed by osmosis.

I was mainly into giant robots in childhood. Receiving a Macross figure for my birthday. Pouring over the manual for The Crescent Hawks' Revenge, which my brother left behind:

While I was not much a fan of mecha, I was very much a fan of Evangelion. I spent my middle teens obsessed with it. The biomechanical, pseudo-mystical stuff; the teen angst. I wanted to be Shinji. I thought trauma was so cool.

So cringe. Anyway:

One of the inspirations for To Put Away A Sword is the survivors-rebuilding-a-town-and-planting-rice sequence in Thrice Upon A Time; probably my favourite part of the whole franchise, now.

The joy and difficulties of trying to build your paradise in the weird ruins of the old world:

Yeah, the adventure has a lot of Evangelion in it. There's a Nerv HQ analogue to explore. There's a content warning for child soldiers.

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The other inspiration for To Put Away A Sword is this piece of box art, an accessory set for Macross's iconic Stonewell Bellcom VF-1 Variable Fighter:

I don't know what this kind of arrange-your-missiles-in-front-of-your-fighter-jet photo is technically called. Hardware porn parade?

You see it often enough. Here's a real-life photo of the Lockheed Martin F35 Joint Strike Fighter:

Fairly or not, in my head I associate mecha with seeing copies of Jane's Defence in airport magazine racks. The genre feels like such a natural way to riff on the hyper-charged corpo-military-industrial complex.

After the brush war ends, and the natural resources extracted, and the ethnic cleansing concluded, and the profits announced, who gets to clean up after a Raytheon missile?

In To Put Away A Sword---you do.

+

Ultimately, as always, I am writing and designing from my lived experiences.

See that? The gas flare from the Hengyuan Refining Company? It is about 200 metres from my living room.

That gas flare surfaces constantly in the stuff I make. As I write this post I am breathing its acrid chemical smell. My nose itches. I was asthmatic as a child; I seriously worry about cancer, nowadays.

At night it lights up the sky like Barad-dur.

The plant obviously and continuously flaunts regulations. We've tried lodging complaints: with its corporate management; with the Department of Environment. Nothing has worked so far.

"A home on poisoned earth" is a visceral fact of my life.

+

To Put Away A Sword is wish-fulfilment, I guess? In the world of the adventure, at least, the forces that are poisoning your home are post-peak oil.

It is nice to imagine a reality where a kind of survival and flourishing is still possible. My partner Sharon and I talk a lot about imagining hope.

Last month she bought this small mecha-looking thing. A wireless camera! She built a little hut for it on our garden wall. It is trained, 24-7, at the gas flare.

Environmental activists we've met say video evidence of emissions is important. We'll see. We imagine it helping.

+

Anyway. David just sent me this photo of my adventure, in print:

Looking good. I hope folks play it and enjoy it.

Preorder ECO MOFOS and its adventure bundle >>>HERE<<<

[highhhfiveee]

Imagine having to explain to Mike what a Gyatt is😭😭

and the fact that it's not even a noun, but like...an expression. don't get me started lmao. it's like 'GYAT!" 😃

tags: fluff [: (sweet discussions and fun talk of rollercoasters. abby is me, conked out after a twelve hour six flags day).

it'd been a fun saturday; you, mike, and abby had all gone to the popular amusement park in the city, sweating in the lengthy queue lines and pigging out on fried snacks and sweets that made your stomachs gurgle after each ride.

you'd gotten back home late, and abby had fallen asleep in the car, leaving you two to put her to bed before winding down yourselves.

you and mike shower together, pressing your bodies close and massaging at the other's muscles, aiding the scorching water in washing away the tension of activity.

afterwards, you two retreat to your room and slip into your pajamas lethargically, recollecting on the day's thrills. mike falls to the bed as he pulls his shirt over his chest, resting his back against the headboard and grabbing for his phone settled on the nightstand. "'the deep dive' was your favorite?"

you're sitting on your side of the bed, gathering your hair and securing it all at the top of your head before tying your scarf around it. you turn to mike with squinted eyes, challenging, "how could it not be? a 90 degree drop into the ground is crazy. it makes me see stars every time."

mike protests with a squeak, muttering, "eh. that's just it's gimmick. other than that, it's just a glorified 'kinder circuit'" as he stares down at his phone.

"do not compare it to a kid's rollercoaster, mike. that's insulting," you muse playfully, beginning to spread lotion over your arms and hands.

"yeah, yeah," he stalely sighs as his thumb tracked over his phone screen time and time again after a short burst of noise. lately, he'd been prone to doomscrolling on tiktok, hooked after abby had shown him a lot of videos from her for you page, and now, he's furrowing his eyes at videos and replies using this slang he's never heard before.

"do you know what a...'gyat' is?" he questions, trying out the word on his tongue in a few different inflections. "is it like 'guy-yat'? they're saying it like 'guy-yat' in all these videos."

you take a deep breath, rolling your eyes in annoyance as you finish rubbing lotion into the skin of your legs and crawl up to the top of the bed to snuggle into mike's shoulder. "it's not a noun. it's really shortened AAVE, like...'gotdamn', but using it as a noun is its appropriated form."

mike hums, letting out a light chuckle at the frivolity of social media. you go over the term with him, showing him what it really sounds like and means, and he copies you, making you giggle.

"okay, that makes sense. seeing...'latina gyatt' did not make me feel good and now i know why," you full on belly-laugh then, sliding down on the sheets until your head is resting on mike's chest where you feel his own boisterous joy rumble through your cheek.

"well that's good. i can't let you go around being uninformed." mike grins down at you, wrapping his arms around your waist and giving your torso a gentle squeeze. with a tired tone, he mutters, "mmmm, and that's why i love you, baby."

okie short and sweet [: hope you all enjoyed!

faire's seedlings ✿

@leahdhopkins4321-@pyr0-kai-@angstywhore-@sunazroo-@nyxthoughtss-@mirophobic-@fayethor-@marixsimps-@regretfulme-@ithinkitszeph-@707xn-@cattt777-@violetta-ximena-@amnesia33-@topnerd03-@fastnights-@laprvphette-@savage-aespa-@mfdxz-@0-tatiana-0-@dusstory-@delwrites-@mikeschmidtgf-@jun1p3rlol-@xyzstar-@aquamarine001-@atrociouslybear-@ickleronniekinsemotionalrange

[stealer-of-gimmicks]

Please. Do not ask. Why I made this. Anyways I am the gimmick stealer!

(Ran by @nobrain-the-silly, gimmick blog s̶t̶o̶l̶e̶n̶f̶r̶o̶m̶ inspired by @gimmick-thief and @gimmick-copier)

(And also @gimmick-thief-thief and)

Basically, I steal people’s gimmicks! It’s simple!

DNI:

-NSFW

-Pedos and zoophiles

-All Phobics

-Israel Supporters

Tags:

#Gimmick = Stolen - When I steal a gimmick

#Imagine getting your gimmick stolen - Stealing gimmicks, but make it ✨fancy✨ (I use this one way too much)

#Other crap - Not related to stealing gimmicks whatsoever

#Requested - Requested gimmick blogs to steal (you can request via asks!)

#Unconventional - What the fuck does this mean

#lore time - Lore. (Inspired by @your-gimmick-has-been-stolen‘s lore tag)

Edit: Apparently there are WAAAAY more gimmick stealing blogs than I thought, but I only took inspiration from the ones I knew about.

Masterlist:

[kineticpenguin]

How to Be a Guntuber

Hit the Gym. Nobody wants to hear about guns from fat people. 75% of your audience is looking to buy a magic talisman that will make them feel strong, and you need to lean into that. You're basically trying to be an Influencer, so work on that Instagram game.

Be Kinda Horny. Pepper your description of the experience of shooting the gun with as many sexual metaphors as possible, e.g. "shoots faster than you did the first time a girl touched your Special Area." If you're feeling extra creative, imagine a Kind Of Girl and compare the gun to her. Yes, just create a "___ GF" meme to compare to the gun. It's that easy! Don't worry about accidentally saying more about yourself than the gun in the process, your audience will never notice.

Use Dogwhistles. They attract a loyal audience, and any attempts to call you out on it will only stir up engagement. Sell your soul and game that algorithm, baby! Be sure to wink at the camera when you're dressed as a Nazi (totally ironically) and say something about how "They will try to cancel me for this one!"

Get Close-Ups of Rapid Fire. What are you shooting at? Are you even hitting anything? Nobody cares, it just looks cool.

Create an Obnoxious Gimmick or Catchphrase. This one can be surprisingly tricky, so if you can't come up with one right away, you can always limp along with random slow-motion footage set to license free dramatic music until you figure out your Brand.

Remember: You Can Always Lie. Not enough cash to burn through 3,000 rounds of the finest Swiss match ammo to run with the big dogs? Fuck it, just say you did anyway! If anyone even questions it, there's absolutely no way to prove you wrong!

Be Shameless, Copy Anything. When you're out of ideas, there's always more room for more "how many rubber dog turds can progressively bigger guns penetrate" videos.

[grailfinders]

Grailfinders Viewers' Choice: Beast IV L

if anything's getting my icon blurred out, it's this one. anyways!

it's that time of the month once again, and this time I feel like an absolute beast. well, to be more accurate, y'all felt like getting an absolute beast. a beast (fgo definition) that summons beasts (D&D definition). I'm sure this won't be confusing at all.

as usual I highly doubt this build is even remotely balanced for actual PvE play, but beasts are supposed to be world ending threats, so that shouldn't be a surprise.

the build itself will be under the cut, because hoo boy there's a lot to go over.

first up, beast IV can show up in her standard Koyanskaya form, which is the one primarily used when outside her lair. this is effectively a suped-up version of Koyanskaya of Dark, with access to unlimited weaponry and NFF-brand grenades, all of which work like standard "weapons of <x> slaying" do in D&D- they deal extra damage to humanoids, and can knock humanoids prone.

the big addition here aside from standard high-level-boss resistances is her Add to the Collection ability, where once per day she can try to forcibly plane shift a non-humanoid creature into a demiplane of her creation, basically putting them in suspended animation. this will be important for later.

form two is effectively Koyanskaya's big shadowy fox form. I didn't make any hard and fast rules about how these forms connect to one another, but I would probably say her masked form can turn into this combat form once a day, probably for a couple minutes at a time.

the gimmick for this fight is her Seasonal Cycle, which both reduces the number of legendary actions she gets to actually attack people each round, but also gives her buffs. I tried to keep this close to her lostbelt-based buffs in her final fight, but I also changed the names to be less FGO-centric if you want to use this build in a game. there's not a ton to say about this one that isn't regurgitating the seasonal cycle, it's just Masked Form with a bigger focus on kicking humanoid ass.

The big nipply form shown in the build picture has a lot of text, but I'll do what I can to break it down. This is Beast IV's final form, and it's the one that sets up the Tunguska Sanctuary in the first place, so there's a lot going on. Once again her humanoid-slaying effect grows larger, but she can only take this form in her lair, plus her speed is cranked wayyy down at this point. I just. cannot imagine that thing moving any faster than a crawl. if you need something done fast, that's what your lackeys are for.

speaking of lackeys, let's Reveal the Collection. this is a ten-minute ritual, which upon completion can summon copies of creatures that were stored by the Masked Form. The higher the CR of the creatures being made, the less you can make at a time, and the shorter your range is. there's also a lesser version of this you can do as a legendary action, and it's restricted to one creature at a time, of up to CR 10.

but of course, you need a place to put all those creatures! that's why she's got Regional Effects too! it's a whole lot of text, but it basically boils down to making a life zone and a death zone around her lair. half of your collection will tend towards the life zone, and half towards the other. in the life zone, the area is choked by plants, slowing down all humanoids in the area, and also healing effects targeting non-humanoids are more powerful. the death zone has extreme heat, and humanoids have disadvantage on saves against it. also, all summoned creatures in this region have double their normal perception distance when it comes to perceiving humanoids.

-------------

So overall, this build isn't a world-ending threat like Tiamat, or an orbital laser like Goetia, but she's not supposed to be a full-grown beast yet, so I'd cut her some slack. plus, if your party includes non-humanoid players you can make a dozen clones of them to fight the party which sounds like a really fun time. that being said, I do pity any DM who as to keep track of her seasonal buffs in a fight.

[yabashiri]

I'm back with a bang. Project Fiction - an Irumatsu and Irujnko fic will be finally published in its entirety! First arc is up, at about 50k words and 7 chapters. Read more to see if it's your cup of tea.

Do you hate some things about DR canon? Do you wish the talent system in Hope's Peak was more explored? Then read no further! I'll copy some bullet points from PF's description on AO3 and explain them in more details.

This work has: - Heavy OOC for Iruma and Kaede

PF!Iruma is not lewd, but she's a hothead, a reserve course student, and she also likes basketball. Weird, right? She also has nothing to do with inventions, her true talent is more of an abstract concept in line with your usual 'hope' and 'despair' gimmicks. It allows me to create a story with no killing games, but filled with tension similar to how Death Note is considered a 'shounen' even though it's a detective mystery.

As for Kaede, be warned that she only appears in chapter 8 for the first time. Remember her pre!game line in v3? "I don't have faith in humanity". What if I based her entire character on that and pitted against this Iruma? You can't imagine how heated it gets. - In-depth exploration of how Hope's Peak works, what's a 'talent' and how it impacts the chosen students

Do you know how talents are assigned? How scouts do their work? How exactly Kamukura Izuru was made and what studying on the reserve course is like? I know, and I'll show you in great detail.

- Nods to the canon, while turning the plot of DR1 upside-down.

Junko's game plan stays the same: kill the council, rebel the reserve course, fill the world with despair. With Iruma, however... not all goes as planned. It's not a story about people stuck together until almost all of them die. We go from Hope's Peak to an open world, and you'll see famously neon Tokyo in all its glory.

- Heated gay arguments, a weird online game, absurd talents beyond your average human standards.

While the story goes beyond ships and their dynamics, it has that in spades. I also present to you a certain game by Team DANGAN, and it's not about a pun-making bear torturing students. Imagine Genshin Impact's combat but more tactical, focused on PvP. That -- and much more.

- An abundance of author notes. This one has a lot to say.

I'll be straight with you, I put a shit ton of details into my works. Chekhov's Armoury is a trope I came up with before I realized it existed. I'll give you fanarts, songs, memes. Basically I've never had a lot of readers so I had to get used to creating fan content by myself.

- Typos I am translating this work into English, and while I'm pretty confident in my abilities, I am not perfect. It's kinda hard to know how real people talk when you're not exposed to the language on a daily basis. If anyone wants to be my beta, I'll be honored.

Translating this thing is ungodly hard. Writing it took me 4 years and was even harder. This story means a lot to me, I put my heart and soul into it, and I truly hope someone will enjoy it as much as I do. I also hope someone makes a TV Tropes page for it one day :D This is my only dream as a creator.

Give it a shot -- you won't regret it.

I hope.

[hungry-skeleton]

And if you want an actual question: what exactly is Skylanders? You post about it frequently, but only serve to vex me further each time.

I'll get to your first ask soon I need to go off about this

Skylanders is a toys to life game from 2011-2016!! Toys To Life is a genre that's died out but basically it means using physical toys to interact with the digital game world. In this case Skylanders uses figurines of the characters called.... Skylanders.. And placing them on the "portal" allows you to play as them!!

The skylanders themselves have things called NFC chips inside them that store data about what character they are and the progress you made with them. So you aren't just using a copy of some specific character, your skylander is truly yours. The upgrades, money, and cosmetics you give them are saved on them forever unless you actively choose to reset them.

^^Not an actual skylander character. This item is called a creation crystal! I'll get to that later!

Over it's run skylanders has made at least 175 unique skylanders characters. Each character coming with their own special animations, personality, and back story. This isn't including any of the gimmick items that could also be used on the portal like the creation crystal from above.

Each game came with a unique gimmick that introduced new skylanders that could do special things in game!

Spyros adventure - the first installment. No special gimmick yet, at this point the entire gimmick WAS the toys to life gameplay

Giants - the Giants!! Characters that were VERY big and could do "feats of strength" and other special actions in game

Swap force - characters that could swap their top and bottom halves to combine and mix abilities

Trap team - introduced traptanium crystals!! A neat idea, you could use a physical crystal item to capture special enemies and use them to fight for you in game! What was cool about these is that they really tried to sell the immersion of the villains being inside the crystals you trapped them in by having the crystal on the portal occasionally glow and talk. It also functioned similarly to a skylander in that the game remembers what crystals you used to capture what villains. Or more specifically the chip inside the crystal itself stores that information

Superchargers - THEY HAVE CARS NOW. Also this game had incredible writing for absolutely no reason what

Imaginators - whatever!!! Make your own skylander!!! That's what the creation crystals are for! To store your custom made skylanders! The character customization is actually pretty good. Also the sensies but all they really do is unlock stuff for you lol

As for the actual gameplay it's a platforming beat em up with puzzle elements, every installment mixes up the gameplay a decent bit though, especially superchargers which focused a lot on it's vehicles. In the end they're still kids games so they aren't SUPER challenging and the story isn't too complex but they're enjoyable nonetheless.

I think one of the biggest appeals of playing is how important the game makes you feel. Like, skylanders tries to make itself as immersive as it can be. There's a canonical explanation for why the skylanders are in your possession and in the form of figures. The player themselves is canon to the story and is referred to as a Portal Master. Essentially, only you can command the skylanders and everyone's lives are counting on you. If that doesn't inflate your ego enough one of the first things that happens in the first game is a major NPC calling out to you like a god. Very good for a 9 year olds self confidence

The overall vibe of skylanders is very goofy and whimsical but it has its more serious action moments too. Skylanders is all about character, I think. Both the skylanders themselves and the NPCs. There's not many characters I can really say I don't like. The lore is surprisingly intricate... Though it also has it's goofy moments.. Like the ancient race of sapient robots having all of its moral members being killed by exploding volleyballs. I don't care who you are that's top quality writing.

Skylanders is very important to me, it was one of my first full video game experiences and it's influenced my art a lot. Not to mention my um... Collection..

Still trying to complete it!!

But anyhow, this game means the world to me. I love having other people I can share that love with, :) I wish the game was more accessible nowadays but I've heard there's some functional emulators!

I.. Wow I really fucking went off here.. Hm.. I guess that counts for your first ask too lmao, I hope this was legible!

[gimmick-thief]

Imagine getting your gimmick stolen copied ...

(im not the gimmick copier but i just had to lmao)

>:(

[princess-of-the-corner]

Kingdom Hearts II: Final Mix Recap: Olympus Coliseum (TItan Cup)

Because I keep forgetting to put this at the end: Credit to Mudarrow and KH Wiki.

The Titan Cup’s gimmick is that you start with 300 Key Points (KH Wiki says 500, but the YouTuber I’m watching started with WAY less than that) that go down every time you get hit. The stronger the attack, the more Key Points Sora will lose.

Unlike the Doom Counter in Marluxia’s fight, you have no way of replenishing this number, and you’ll be disqualified if the points ever drop to 0.

During Rounds 5-10, rocks will fall, and each can take off 12 Key Points per hit.

Plus, you still have to manage Sora’s HP, AND Sora’s party members can’t join him in the tournament.

However, Sora can use Summons while alone.

Genie is a good summon for this, especially in his copy of Master Form, thanks to his “Arcana” command.

If your Summons are at their current cap, you’ll be able to use Genie’s Limit 3 times.

This battle includes Emblem Heartless from Space Paranoids and Hollow Bastion, Neoshadows, Sky Pirates, all of the Nobody enemy types encountered thus far (save for Creepers), and the boss.

The boss for this tournament is Hercules.

He has all of his attacks from the first game, minus the one where he takes out his sword and starts spinning like a Beyblade.

However, he does not have access to the divine aura that made him invincible, which ultimately means he’s probably the easiest boss in the entire Underdrome.

Or rather, his divine aura only materializes during certain punching attacks, and goes away as soon as he’s done.

He can also use it to power up a super-mega-powerful punching attack, but it only covers his fist, and you can attack him as long as you dodge.

You can tell when you’ve set off his revenge values, because he’ll always glow before retaliating.

The Titan Cup has classical Greek-style paintings of the Titans along the sides.

Winning the Tournament earns Goofy the Genji Shield (+6 Attack, +0 Magic, and Hyper Healing) plus a Skillful Ring for the party (Accessory that gives +5 AP to the wearer).

Now, it’s time to head off to Port Royal.

-

Sora: “God can you imagine being taken out by a rock??”

Goofy: “...........”

[gimmick-copier]

i am looking at your banner

Achievement Unlocked

Dude, why did you do that?

it explicitly says not to.

[watching-pictures-move]

Movie Review | Brainstorm (Trumbull, 1983)

Contains a horrifying scene where a man is found in his goon cave, twitching and unresponsive, his brain totally destroyed by pornography. Hmmmm…. Maybe I should reconsider some of my viewing habits.

Anyway, the central visual gimmick here, where the real life sequences are shot in a one aspect ratio and the VR sequences are shot in a wider aspect ratio and usually with wide angle lenses, is a sturdy enough one, although I imagine the results would have been horrible to watch on TV back in the day. There are moments of visual beauty, like the almost avant garde reduction of high tech machinery into light and line and colour when a certain character passes away, as well as the 2001-style lightshow at the end. The fact that this was originally meant to be shot in a higher frame rate to intensify the reality of the VR sequences also means that it’s the only movie you’re allowed to watch with motion smoothing on. Get all your relatives who haven’t fixed their TV settings a copy of this for Christmas this year.

But this is beholden to a techothriller backbone that Trumbull clearly has no passion for, and despite the scenes of characters looking at screens during tense moments, I don’t think he’s able to breathe much excitement into the proceedings. (Interestingly, the bad guys here are the feds, when they would probably be a Silicon Valley tech bro enterprise were the movie made today.) Christopher Walken and Louise Fletcher are both pretty fun to watch. Walken gets some nice freakouts, while Fletcher smokes enough cigarettes to smell the secondhand smoke through the screen. But the movie neglects to give them much in the way of character development, so there’s little investment in what happens to them. This is mostly known for being Natalie Wood’s last movie, and it’s a little unfortunate it gives her so little to do.

This shares some DNA with Tron, but I think that movie is better able to shape its narrative around its effects, and repurposes its lack of characterization into something poignant and moving. At the risk of sounding glib, it’s obvious that Trumbull only cared about visual experimentation here, so I wonder if this would have played better as a short, the kind that plays during a Disneyland ride where you’re strapped in for the experience.

[honeybellexox]

IPKKND - Suicide Track (A Rant)

TW- I will be discussing the subject matter of suicide, abuse, mental health and self harm.

So, I’ve been stewing over the infamous Suicide track in IPK. The more I watch it, the more vexed I fee, l for numerous reason so I’ll be letting off a little bit of steam.

Firstly, the whole track was extremely tone-deaf. Why was such a serious subject matter handled in such a disgusting manner?! …incredibly insensitive and irresponsible. There was not an ounce of comedy, in fact imagine a vulnerable person watching that scene and heaven forbid, they felt inspired to copy Khushi. Incredibly distasteful.

(Edit: note the body language in this picture, Arnav is towering over her in such a threatening way, she looks distraught, vulnerable and frightened, if I had never seen this show and just seen this still, I would believe she was at risk of abuse/ in danger from the man standing in front of her, it’s almost scary!)

Secondly, I cannot begin to fathom how Arnav handled the whole situation, like my mind reels when I begin to process it. Sir, your wife just attempted to end her life, a little compassion would go a long way. It is so disturbing how Arnav berates Khushi, uses abusive language and drops the ‘terrace bombshell on her, just moments after she tried to jump off a high building. If anything, that would make someone want to reattempt. I refuse to believe that this is true to his character. Yes, Arnav struggles with his anger. Yes, his judgement becomes clouded by said anger but I just can’t get behind the idea that he would choose that moment to yell and taunt the woman he loves. I wouldn’t even treat my worse enemy that way, not even Shyam deserves that. Arnav has shown signs of profound emotional intelligence throughout the show, understanding nuances and emotional complexity, how could the same man react to his beloved’s suicide attempt in such a way?! (I’m not buying it).

Lastly, I absolutely LOATHE how once again Khushi’s mental health was completely trivialised. Her suicide attempt was treated as no big deal, it was never once addressed or acknowledged by any character again, not even in Arnav’s ‘apology’, also compare how he reacted to Anjali’s self harm/suicide attempt. The writers used Khushi’s suicide as a cheap gimmick, a lazy convenient way to rush a confession out of Arnav. Khushi didn’t deserve this nor did the viewers and especially the viewers who have been personally affected by suicide.

I profusely apologise in advance, if my opinions come across too strongly but I really had to get this off my chest!

Love, Honey xx

[graytrailcam]

Shelter 1 Playthrough

Re-Downloaded my copy of the original Shelter Game upon realizing the series is now ten years old! I deeply adore these games, they have excellent art direction and music score, and are nice and short.

Mama Badger starts out with five cubs it looks like, I really enjoyed the opening credits as you walk through and out of your burrow, very cinematic.

Lots of digging for roots and such to feed the kiddos, much prefer hunting the voles than the frogs though personally. I do really enjoy that they let you kill foxes for a big meal that feeds all your kids. Don't fuck with Mama Badger I guess.

Didn't get any screenshots because I was STRESSED but I love the threat of the Eagle. The soundtrack is catchy but anxiety inducing, and the patches of grass are JUST far enough apart to be a bit of a panic each time, I was never sure.

The Nighttime level was the one I got the most turned around in. The earliest chunk of the map had me running in circles before I realized where I was actually going, but I loved the way the cubs would huddle to you in a tight circle and flee whenever there was a crack or rustle in the bushes. I think the color palette for this one was also my favorite.

The Rapids level was fun, it was nice to have a threat that wasn't the Eagle or Starvation.

I ended up losing one of my cubs along the way up the river. I didn't notice until it was far too late, I can't tell if he got swept away or simply left behind.

Regardless, the next level was absolutely my favorite. I loved the Forest Fire level.

The growing fire across the brush you use to hide in from the Eagle was especially nerve wracking due to most of this level being how you have to Avoid the Bird.

I made a couple mad decisions, and my second cub ended up getting grabbed before we could make it to safety unfortunately.

And I entered the final level with just three kids left.

The atmosphere for this one was very uncomfortable from the get go. There wasn't any gimmicks immediately present like the others, just mostly available food and then an open field.

Most of this level was dodging the Eagle again, though unlike the others, it wouldn't leave once it grabbed a cub. After losing my third one, and still hearing it flying above hunting us was a good indicator that this would be the final time I encountered this bird.

Making it across the field took a minute or so. But I kept the remaining two cubs safe until we reached a point where the Eagle was consistently swooping down and aiming for Mama Badger instead of the smaller cubs.

At the end of it all, Mama Badger gets grabbed and carried off by the Eagle, leaving her two remaining offspring to continue on their own.

The final shots pan over your cubs as they continue onward without you, I imagine if I had done a better job and had more of them survive this would have been a more satisfying shot lol

But I did really enjoy the very last bit before the credits where it shows the Eagle carrying your body towards her own nest, keeping with the theme of the game.

Highly recommend the Shelter Series if you have the ability to pick it up. They are nice little snapshots of Xenofiction that are harder to come by than others.

[felikatze]

Hi I hate downloading programs and spending money but I’m very interested in your fire emblem guys. Do you have any advice as to how I can best look into more details about them?

You are at the correct address, friend. You say you hate downloading programs but alas it is the best way to not spend money.

In the following you will find a basic summary of FEA, an abridged 3DS emulation guide, and whatever else abt FEA i word vomited.

This got long.

Basic Gist: My Guys (this is the second time someone has called them that, amazing) are Chrom and Robin from Fire Emblem Awakening for the 3DS. If you just want the basics, you can watch a let's play of them, I guess? I used this cutscene compilation to check things for my. fea fanfic. and god bless it is a playthrough where chrom and robin are married because it just makes the story better. it does.

If you don't know shit about FEA: Chrom, prince of the halidom of Ylisse, finds an amnesiac tactician out in a field. They, Robin, join his militia, the Shepherds. The group sets off to combat a new threat of zombies. At the same time, they attempt to solve the mystery of "Marth", a masked person who came through a weird portal together with the zombies.

Listen man you know who "Marth" is. I don't need to tell you.

If you don't know shit about Fire Emblem: FE is an SRPG fantasy series frequently referred to as "anime chess" because it is. It has a permadeath mechanic (if a unit dies, they r gone forever) but newer games, including FEA, also include a non-permanent death mode. The choice is yours.

The writing: certainly questionable sometimes. The Valm Arc™ is kind of famous as filler, because a new character gets to be protagonist for a few chapters. Say'ri, you're neat an' all, but do we need to do this?

Disclaimers: fea is kinda colorist. Which if you know fire emblem is (deep sigh) to be expected. Why are only non-playable Plegian characters brown and all the playable ones white? You know why.

Side characters rely heavily on gimmicks to define them which is either endearing or annoying. Depends on you. Also there is a loli dragon and I've seen THREE separate mods that redesign her. God people hate nowi's design (i'm people)

The game has a marriage mechanic. If two characters reach Support Rank S, they get married (straight married only though there IS a gay mod). Then their time traveling kid from the future shows up. You can have Chrom and Robin get married in-game (if Robin is a girl. I specifically picked F!Robin to do so) but they will REGARDLESS be the sappiest bitches on earth about each other. Even if they are married to other people. It can feel kind of awkward, I'd imagine.

Despite my disclaimers I will say that I was overall engaged with FEA's story on a moment to moment basis; it moves at a brisk pace without dragging, I found the emotional conceit at the heart of it all deeply compelling, and I overall just had a lot of fun.

With a cutscene comp you get the usual drawbacks: no side content. Some of the supports (optional conversations between characters) are fucking hilarious (looking at henry) and you also miss out on paralogues (sidequests) which include the second generation characters besides Lucina (my daughter whom I love).

If it's 3DS emulation you're looking for, Citra is your best friend. It's available for both PC, both Windows and Linux, though I have better experience on the former. It also has an Android App now, and from my scant experience with it, it runs great. Citra is definetly the No. 1 3DS emulator. No competition.

If your PC isn't on the higher end, fiddle with settings until you get to a grade of chugging that you're comfy with. I don't know what i did to get the game run smooth. Set audio to mono though bcuz it cuts out echo from lag.

As for a totally legit copy of Awakening, my usual go to vimm's lair doesn't have it, but the Reddit Roms Megathread does. Reddit is the best piracy help site fr.

Awakening Rom: Here. It's in alphabetical order, so scroll down to F till you find it. Or use the search bar.

Awakening DLC: Here. Same as above, use the search bar. Europe or USA version at your discretion.

If Citra complains that the files are encrypted: use the Batch Cia Decryptor. It's for windows.

DLC can be installed via the handy dandy "Add DLC" button citra has. I recommend dlc solely because the Future Past dlc has soo much Grima characterization that makes me go rabid. Highly recommend. I watched cutscenes of this one because I'm not smart enough to actually beat it.

When playing on Citra, I recommend turning off battle animations, since they're the laggiest part to emulate. Without them, my game ran smooth.

If you specifically want to see Chrobin, you will get more than enough of them in the base game. If you want to see my babygirl grima, you will likely question my choice in blorbos from base game alone.

There's also Fire Emblem Heroes, the mobile game, which has the famous day of devotion Chrobin duo unit, but: not worth it.

On gameplay tips: I'm very bad at strategy games. FEA is toughest early game in my opinion. Use Frederick liberally for his high defense stat until he's trash mid-game. Pair up is busted. If you pair Lon'qu up with someone who gives him + Speed (like Panne <- I am biased toward this pairing) he is basically unhittable.

Chrom and Robin are both very good units who will SHRED. robin's future kid morgan also shreds. #morgansweep. there's like. a whole skill inheritance system and like ideal parent combos for good stats or whatever but I got by fine ignoring it. i benched basically all of the second gen units except morgan and lucina. rip to them.

The base game can be vry easy it's just the dlc that is Very Difficult <- looked dlc up on youtube.

Additional Chrobin content includes, once again FEH, but i mainly just look at the art anyway, Fire Emblem Warriors (solid mid tier game but high tier co-op chaos experience with extremely garbage plot), and most recently the Fire Emblem Engage DLC, where Chrom and Robin get to chill in a bracelet as ghosts together. I don't have engage i just (once again) looked it up on youtube.

If you do decide to play FEA and like it, i will recommend you my favorite chrobin fics in a heartbeat. And, god forbid, you like Grima a smidgen as much as I do, i have. so many thoughts about him. And fic recs. Chrom/Grima ficrecs even. I love chrobin and chrom/grima equally because [if my incessant posting didn't spoil this twist i will be geniuenly suprised.]

TLDR:

watch cutscenes of FEA on youtube or emulate it ig. have fun.

[owlixx]

Kirby Series Retrospective Thoughts

I am all done! Well, mostly anyways, but we will talk about that. I beat all the mainline Kirby games from Dream Land to Robobot, so first lets rank those:

Super Star (Ultra) - Played this one as a kid and it holds up. Pitch perfect balance of everything. Great copy abilities, multiple moves per ability, local coop, lots of modes. I had the most fun playing this one and it almost felt like every other game was good or bad based on its proximity to Super Star. Kirby feels his best here.

Triple Deluxe - Maybe it was because I had such low expectations, but I was blown away by this title. I really enjoyed the variety of gameplay gimmicks and the use of 3D, plus the new powers.

Planet Robobot - Honestly this game felt like DLC for Triple Deluxe with a downgraded framerate once you get past the robot gimmick, which is better than Hypernova but doesn't make the game for me. I almost hesitate to even rank these games separately but I definitely had more fun playing Triple Deluxe

Squeak Squad - I did really have a hard time putting this game down and it is highly underrated to me, if lacking a bit of its own identity.

Return to Dream Land - Again, a little on the generic side, but felt like a nice evolution of what Squeak Squad established with having lots of levels with optional collectibles. Funny though that Squeak Squad mastered having fun unlockable tied to collectibles and no other game managed to recapture that exactly. World 6 slaps. A bit generic,

Nightmare in Dream Land (Adventure) - Frustrating only having 1 move per copy ability, but makes sense with it being a remake of the original. Still a pretty fun time all things considered.

64: The Cystal Shards - I don't like the way Kirby feels to move and fight in this game but the ability mixing is very fun, even if I settled on beating the game using Darth Maul's lightsaber exclusively (which was a lot of fun)

Dream Land - Honestly surprisingly fun and "Kirby feeling" despite the lack of copy abilities, just a bit on the short side of course.

Dream Land 3 - Hated this one. I didn't like the level design. I didn't like the "pick a friend and hope it was the right one" system of forcing you to replay levels arbitrarily. Felt like a step backwards from the gameplay and variety of Super Star. Likely would've enjoyed more if I had only played Dream Land 1/2 beforehand. Did not finish. Cute art style. Hated how Glooey steals your health only to never do anything useful. I don't enjoy the concept of mixing powers and friends because it feels more like playing optimally is the normal experience and picking wrong is both random and punishing.

Dream Land 2 - I did beat the main game (not the secret boss), but it was rough and I had to turn on invincibility to power through. It simply isn't fun to me. I do not like the friend system. Rick makes me fall in bottomless pits. Kine is slow and cumbersome out of water. The bird slaps though. Only a handful of copy abilities and most of them suck, even if you do get four different version of each ability. The level design feels monotonous and straightforward. Feels distinctly less "Kirby" even than Dream Land 1.

Amazing Mirror - My absolute least favorite, I could only get about an hour in before calling it quits. A baffling game. The level design seems to be designed intentionally screwy to force you to play multiplayer and split up. Everyone calls this a "metroidvania" but every other Metroidvania in the world gives you permanent upgrades and doesn't end you back to the hub world for picking the wrong door. Imagine if Hollow Knight just killed you for taking the left door instead of the right door, and that is how this game felt for me to play. It's not even necessarily that I just "dislike" this game, I don't see it as a genuinely playable game in single player. I must have been missing something because I cannot imagine anyone being interested in seeing Kirby turned into a life or death Monty Hall problem over and over and over. Missile is a fun copy ability though. If you are an Amazing Mirror fan, then please see this as me experiencing a "disconnect" with this game rather than an attack on your interests.

All in all, I really enjoyed the Kirby series. It was a lot easier and more nostalgic than doing the Mega Man series, although I learned a lot more there. Also, it is shocking how many Kirby "spinoffs" there are. At this point, the main series almost feels like the spinoff itself.

Also, very scary how Dream Land, Dream Land 2 (even if I hate it lol), Amazing Mirror, Nightmare in Dream Land, Squeak Squad, Canvas Curse, Mass Attack, Epic Yarn, Triple Deluxe, original Return to Drema Land, Robobot, Rainbow Curse, plus the many 3DS spinoff eshop games are about to die in just a month! And some of those eshop games are literally digital only, like Blowout Blast. Huge blow to games conservation when the 3DS/Wii U eshops go down :( thank god for so-called "pirates". Imagine if someone had rescued materials from the Library of Alexandria or the Hollywood fire and been branded a thief. Obviously playing video games for free and preserving important historical documents aren't equally noble, but it genuinely scares me to think about how fleeting my favorite art form is.

So what next? My next series is most likely going to be No More Heroes since I can play the two Wii originals on my Wii U natively and I actually own the third game on Switch and have been meaning to play it, and the games aren't too long.

First, I am still wrapping up Kirby, to be fair. I may do Meta Knightmare and similar modes in Super Star, Triple Deluxe, Robobot, Return to Dream Land, etc.

I could play any of the spinoffs, which Blowout Blast seems to be the most appetizing of, but I could also sink some time into Air Ride (I actually hadn't booted it up yet as part of this operation since I am already fairly familiar)

But also in between series, I want to read some comic books and do some twitch streams with my new PC. Fake Fan Alex is my twitch and youtube handle, shameless plug.

Also! I am going to try the Switch demos splitscreen to determine if any of them warrant immediate purchase, or if I want to wait for a steeper discount, which could be a fun way of waiting to determine when my second Kirby phase will be.