#incredible and thoughtful video

[abovetherainandroses]

Patrick loses his hat headbanging during Tell That Mick; Joe helps out (x)

[maevesweirdart]

ok so i just finished reading this gay furry visual novel called Adastra, and i have to say.

it didn’t have the devastating emotional effect that i’ve heard it tends to have on many other readers, but then again i’m pretty sure that’s just because i’m attracted to large buff sword-wielding women and not large buff wolf boys.

and then i realized

thinking about this. thinking

[yellowocaballero]

Been a fan of your fics for YEARS. I was just telling my friend how despite how much I read fics I never actually love them, with some of your fics (especially TMA) as the exception. Felt the need to reread some of them and saw you reblogged some ISAT fanart. So. Any thoughts on ISAT you'd like to share?

Hope you have a wonderful day!! So happy I found your fics again!!

I avoided answering this for a while because I was trying to think of a way to cohesively and coherently vocalize my thoughts on In Stars and Time. I have given up because I don't want to hold everybody here all day and I have accepted that my thoughts are just pterodactyl screeching.

I love it so much. I have so much to say on it. It drove me bonkers for like a week straight. I have AUs. It's absolute Megbait. They're just a little Snufkin and they're having the worst experience of anybody's life. Ludonarratives my fucking beloved.

I am going to talk about the prologue.

The prologue is such a fascinating experience. You crack open the game and immediately begin checking off all of the little genre boxes: mage, warrior, researcher, you're the rogue...some little kid who's there for some reason...alright, you know the score. You're in yet another indie Earthbound RPG, these are your generic characters, let's get the ball rolling.

Except then you realize that these characters are people. You feel instantly how you've entered the game at its last dungeon, at the end of the adventure. They have their own in-jokes, histories, backgrounds, adventures. They get along well and they're obviously close, but not in a twee or unrealistic way. They have so much chemistry and spirit and life. I fell in love with them so quickly.

But Sif doesn't. Sif kind of hates them, because they will not stop saying the same damn thing. They walk the same paths, do the same things, make the same jokes, expect Sif to say the same lines. They keep referencing a Sif we do not see, with jokes we never see him make and heroic personality he never shows - they reference a Sif who is dead - and Sif can't handle that, so he kills them too.

They become only an exercise in tedious frustration. Sif button mashes through their dialogue, Sif mindlessly clicks the same dialogue options, Sif skips through the tutorial, Sif blows through the puzzles. Sif turns their world into a video game. Sif is playing a generic RPG. Sif forgets their names. They are no longer people with in-jokes, histories, backgrounds, adventures. They're the mage, the warrior, the researcher, and...some random kid.

I did not understand the Kid's presence at first. I had no idea what they contributed to the game. They didn't do anything. As a party member in a video game, they're a bit useless. Why is the Kid there?

Because Sif's life isn't a video game. Because the kid isn't 'the kid'. They're Bonnie. Bonnie, who the party loves. Why is Bonnie there? Because they love them. There is no room for Bonnie in the boring RPG that Sif is playing. And then you realize that Sif is wrong, and that they've lost something extremely important, and that they'll never escape without it.

Watching the prologue before watching ISAT gave ISAT the most unique air of dread and horror, because you crack open ISAT and you see the person Sif used to be. You realize that Sif used to be a person. Sif used to be the person who made jokes, who gave real smiles, who interacted with the world as if they are a part of it. And you know you are sitting down to watch Sif lose everything that made them a person, to lose everything that made them a member of this world, and turn them into a character in a video game who doesn't understand the point of Bonnie at all.

At the climax of the game, when the others realize that something is deeply wrong and that Sif physically cannot tell them, they realize that there is nothing they can do. So Bonnie declares snacktime. And for the first time they have snacktime.

What is snacktime? Classic JRPGs don't have snacktime. There's literally no point to a snacktime - not in a video game, and not in Sif's terrible life. It's not fixing this, because nothing can fix this. But Bonnie gives Sif a cookie and Sif eats it.

It's meaningless. It's a cutscene. It didn't save Sif and it didn't change a thing. It will make no difference in the end.

But it did make the difference. It made all of the difference in the world. Bonnie is a character who you really don't understand the point of before you realize that Bonnie was the entire point.

ISAT is about comfort media. Why do we play the same video games over and over again? Why do we avoid watching the finale of our favorite shows? What is truly comforting: a story with no conflict, or a story where you always know what is about to happen? Do you want to live in a scary, uncontrollable world, or do you want to play Stardew Valley? Do you want a person or a character?

When I beat Earthbound for the first time (and if you don't know, the prologue/ISAT battle system is just Mother) and watched the ending cutscene where the characters part ways and say goodbye...I felt a little bit sad. I wanted them to be together forever. But that's something only characters could ever be.

[subtle-as-an-earthquake]

he's so fucking pretty and RIDICULOUSLY sweet oh my goodness AAAAHHH 😭😭💞💞

i told him the OMB was incredible and that i'd been listening to it on repeat and he was like "really? 🥺 that's so kind" and then i gave him some turtle socks i'd brought him (bc why not 🐢) and he loved them and called me a fucking sweetheart and then he hugged me tightly and kissed my cheek 😭😭😭😭🫠🫠🫠 i got so giddy i forgot my record he signed and then he had to walk after me to give it to me 😭 whoopsie

[dandelions-fly-in-summer-skies]

hii anon who sent me that ask, ILY and i tried to make a vid of me singing that as a song, but i fucked up and deleted ur ask accidentally so heres me answering it + a shitty vid <3

confessing smth i thought abt you: youre so cool and cooler than me

(tbh i think that abt most of my mutuals bc ✨insecurity✨)

honestly so real of anon can we get a round of applause

anyways heres the song

ANYWAYS BYE ILY ANON YOURE SO COOL

[karamazovanon]

draw Pyotr topping Stavrogin

[protagonist-art]

theyr about to throw the most overwhelming party in the world <3

[downtherabbitholewithlucy]

| | THE MANY FACES OF WES BORLAND | |

[comraderoscoes]

Lewis Hamilton vs Jenson Button: what is the best thing about being world champion? (narrator voice: he was not joking)

[kingedmundsroyalmurder]

Hildegard von Blingen, coming for me personally.

[Video description: a "bardcore" cover of Paint It Black by the Rolling Stones. The lyrics have been altered to fit a medieval aesthetic and the singer is a soprano with a very pure voice.]

[ihamtmus]

it's weird how jhope is Right There and he's like the Most Talented Person but some armys just. don't see him. should be studied

[betweenblackberrybranches]

I just need to rant for a second :)

Screaming into the void please dont judge me

[unnamed-atlas]

Not cub inventing the minecraft equivalent of the printing press and immediately deciding to use it with the purpose of creating false scarcity lmao

[themidnightcircusshow]

Every new thing I learn about James Somerton's process just drives home how he almost (but really doesn't) knows what he's doing. Yes, of course you use the sources you read as a jumping off point. Of course you copy and paste the important sections into your outline document so you can reread them. That's why you put them in quotation marks.

[tofixtheshadows]

No one suffers more than girls whose faves are the female characters in shounen manga.

[sapphic-luthor]

Congrats on the upcoming anniversary!!! I kept meaning to ask but how is the new living space working out? So extremely happy things seem to be on the up and up for you lately! Hope the vibes are most excellent and sending you more just for good measure - SMA

thank you!!! ngl living w my girlfriend is millions of times better than i ever could have imagined, every day is like waking up on a holiday bc it’s so exciting to be with her All The Time and coming home from work to her is like slipping into the comfiest chair or a hot water bottle-warmed bed in the winter it is just so so so so good. several times a week i have this internal (!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) feeling that is basically just my brain spinning the thought [I LOVE OUR LIFE TOGETHER!!!!!!] in 3d words at the speed of light