#sso dark core goon

[natduskfall]

Happy Dark Core Day!

[writingonjorvik]

Can We Discuss Narrative Incompetence?

I want to go off on this thought a little longer, but it would be a hard tangent from the previous post I commented on about male characters in SSO being written to be incompetent (that's the summary of the thought) to go into this, so it's its own post now.

It is so frustrating because there is a purpose for narrative incompetence. It can help regulate tone, and lower the sense of threat, both of which are important for this being a kids' game. It can provide comic relief and relieve tension. But it has to be handled with balance.

The glaring problem with overusing narrative incompetence in a character who is supposed to be taken seriously, which the villains of a story should be, is that it will eventually circle back onto the main characters. Because if the villains are utterly incompetent, then why can't the heroes defeat them already? And if we add on the layer of issues with SSE's current stance on feminism and girl power : if all of the men are too incompetent to do anything, then what does it say about the competence of the women who still haven't stopped them?

It's one of the reasons that I've felt a particular disconnect with the overconfidence of the Soul Riders lately. Despite us seeing the absolute magical havoc the Dark Riders can cause, the Soul Riders are almost boastfully confident in themselves. In one of the recent quests with growing the seed for the Wild Weave, where we'd mostly been following Linda and the MC, they get cornered in a 2v1. And then Lisa shows up and tells Katja to scram, and Katja just does. Just like that. This also gets into the lack of definition in the full scope of the Soul Riders' abilities beyond "primary trope," but for the purpose of this discussion, it makes no sense for Lisa to be as confident as she is. Why couldn't the MC and Linda handle it on their own? It was a 2v1. Even with one of them protecting the seed, it's not an even match.

We are told over and over throughout the story that the druids, and thereby the current Soul Riders, are keeping the Dark Riders at bay. Not on the backfoot, at a neutral standstill. Worse, we see more examples in the story of the druids taking losses than we see examples of the Soul Riders winning. The lose of the Light Ceremony book, the capture of Lisa and Anne by Dark Core specifically, the Baroness feeling threatened enough by DC/Sands to imprison Linda, the death of Concorde, the death of Elizabeth, the kidnapping Justin for so long as to distract from dealing with the Light Ceremony book or rescuing Lisa and Anne, DC being allied with several witches as to have resources and allies that the druids don't, the discovery of Drakeonium, the restoration of three generals and the return of the fourth. To highlight on that too, the druids don't have any allies outside the druids currently. Tentatively they might have Ydris now, and Mrs. Holdsworth. But there is very little evidence in the narrative of how the druids are even holding their own with no outside help (in fact, there's now further division within the druids and the Keepers as these aren't the same thing) or ready supply of resources.

And yet when we interact with the Dark Riders and DC, they are largely incapable of stopping us in the moment. Their goons are inept, Darko is laughably emo and never shown as a serious threat (let alone shown any reason why he could unseat Sands), and Sands, despite his position as the current commander of Garnok's army, concedes his responsibilities to let his grandson escape. The latter would be an amazing point of interest to follow and talk about inner turmoil Sands is perhaps having now and internal shakeups within DC, but instead we have zeroed in on a cartoon villain level of evil that the other four must always be engaging in by monologuing and then being momentarily foiled by the MC. Because the villains can't be threats when we engage with them.

All of this circles back around to the Soul Riders and makes them look worse for not being able to handle these threats. They feel more and more like they are fumbling backwards into handling these issues, and it brings out their worse traits. Alex is incredibly clumsy and brash, Anne is almost mindlessly angry, Lisa's "eh"ness becomes more glaringly apparent, Linda seems excessively cautious. And none of these traits, individually, are bad. The exploration of them all would make sense in the narrative. Alex is afraid of letting everyone down but she struggles to be a forward thinker. Anne is justifiably upset about the death of her best friend and her imprisonment and desperately needs an outlet to direct that anger. Lisa is, as the party healer, always seeking to be the peacemaker and meet everyone at their needs, at the risk of becoming a people-pleaser herself and losing her identity. And Linda is a young person who can see the future, to include very likely the injuries (some of which are likely fatal) of her and her friends, to the point of fearing taking the wrong course of action.

Each of those would be fascinating to explore. But because the threat they're facing is so unable to actually feel like it's any danger, all of the Soul Riders' fears, their weaknesses and shortcomings, go unchallenged by the narrative. Thus highlighting their weaknesses over their strengths. There is no room to grow, because the force they are fighting against has not been serious enough that they've needed to. So they remain stagnant as characters, which is the worst thing for a main character to be.

And this isn't to say that so incompetent yet still able to pull off their goals can't be a seriously scary situation to be in. But that requires an incompetent head of the evil supported by a competent team of generals, of which we haven't gotten. All of the villains fluctuate on their competency on and off screen. And if the goal was to do this with Sands, Darko would have to seem more competent than him and he is not remotely close to being scarier than Sands. There is in fact no reason for Darko's character that couldn't be written in as being Sands. Every one of his scenes could be replaced and he could be written out entirely. That should say something about how useless he is as a character.

Circling back to the point about this being a broader issue with men in SSO not being able to be intelligent unless they're eccentric old men, this is incredibly damaging to little girls too. SSE has the prime opportunity to highlight healthy masculinity, men comfortable in being masc and femme and themselves, to show little girls (just to follow target audience) what healthy masculinity looks like so that they can set proper boundaries with the men in their lives. That doesn't require writing more male characters or not centering the female main characters. All it requires it writing the existing men in the story well. Showing them trying to help people, like the arcs I suggested for Justin training as a Wild Whisperer bonding people with horses, or Raptor taking over as a record label to help young women enter the industry like Lisa. And this is to gloss over entirely what it does to have those examples for little boys and how that is an important part of feminism too.

Because little girls do need to see those examples too. Most of them will grow up interested in men. That is just statistics. If they grow up thinking purely "men are just too inept to know any better" then we continue to prepare femme people to expect less than the bare minimum because "what else would you expect from a man?" And directly through that message, SSE perpetuates sexism and misogyny. And that message gets women killed every day.

[i-rate-horse-games]

starshine legacy playthrough part 4.3

i had a lot of glitches with the dialogue there… what did i miss… guess i’ll find out! ouch burnt my finger on my poor laptop

Level 3 - The Destiny of the Soulriders

oh ok thanks game!!

lisa referenced her dad but alex’s mom has a Portrait! impressive! and her roots are brown! so alex’s hair probably is also brown! that makes sense bc the Prophecy Fortold that the warrior would have brown hair but only the sightseer has brown hair. been wondering about that

girl WHAT are you planning with a lil kid wearing a soda hat

ah. she’s ransoming him for the horse. ok

i love how anne was all “ugh lisa’s crazy, talking about magic powers and talking to her horse… what’s that? my horse is talking to me? nah, i’m just stressed…” but alex never even questioned it. she just went straight from “oh, that’s my horse whose thoughts i can now hear” to “whoa, just like lisa and linda! cool…” like she just got shown a psychic vision and she’s not at all concerned about the mystical parts of that. good for her!

like she JUST got initiated into secret magic society and she doesn’t even know if mr herman has heard about it or believes in it or anything but instantly she’s like THIS HAPPENED in full confidence that he’ll believe it. alex rocks

FINALLY SOMEONE ADMITS THE PATH IS TREATUEROUSE ! Treah. trecharuous. treacherous . thanks autocorrecet

we just fell off a cliff into the sea… rip alex.

aw rats! fripp says katja is with the baddies…   …wait. wait, was katja the cool emo violinist who made storms who i met in sso? was that her??? i just noticed recently that the four girls in the sso loading image are Those Four… the plot thickenings!!

MURDER POWER MURDER POWER

so funny… big complex explanation to alex on how to use her powers by being in two worlds at once and then he just says “(click left mouse button)”. incredibly dangerous powers that can never be used… click left mouse button

wwwwWWAIT A SECOND! katja’s face is on the GLAMOUR POSTERS!! 

Level 4 - the legend of Garnok

alex just said she would simply Stun the goons with her power, the dangerous power, the power that takes life away,

in this chapter we learn that Garnok exists and is bad & lisa’s dad who works for the dark core just got summoned to the garnok project work site, so garnok is the thing sleeping in the spaceship under the sea and they’re about to be raised! wahooooo

Level 5 - Dark Core Garnok Project

aughh there’s 5 goons to murder without getting caught and i’ve been caught twice so far. this is major because there’s a cutscene and a trail to follow every time i have to restart the mission. murder is hard

wait…     there’s also a tunnel that goes under the sea straight to the garnok project that i’ve been walking past??? so what’s the place with the fight i’ve been going to, then??? mysterious…

ah, ok. gotta fight the goons in order to open the grate they’ve got on the tunnel to keep kids like me from breaking and entering. wah

I JUST ACCIDENTALLY SOULSTRIKED TIN CAN INSTEAD OF MOUNTING HIM

HE SURVIVED BUT EAHSFHKDJHN

i got to the keycard that i need to pick up but i couldn’t click to pick it up because it just kept doing the soulstrike again… guess i need to kill all of the goons first in order to get it…

i have lost track of the number of times i’ve restarted this mission

I GOT THE KEYCARD!!! and only killed 1 goon!

love it when you’re eavesdropping on a guy and he says “good thing that scary girl doesn’t have this book that i’m holding, otherwise she’d be able to defeat us! lmao ammiright lads”

NO I MISSED 

phew! it onlys sent me back to the tunnel!! i don’t have to get the keycard again!! thanks game!!!

missed again

my blast went over their head this time

ok we did all that to get a book about rules that even evil people follow during fights, and using it we can now banish people to the shadow dimension???? isn’t that anne’s thing? oh well

last part

[jorvikzelda]

Where will the battle against Garnok be set?

^ This is a question I keep returning to lately, especially as the main story grows more and more intense. There has to be a grand face-off at some point, right?

In Starshine Legacy, Garnok was never truly released; the efforts to keep this from happening took place in Pandoria. The same applies to the first three books, though there, Garnok came closer to his return and the Dark Riders gave the Soul Riders far more trouble than in SSL. In SSO, we know with certainty that Garnok still resides in this Pandorian prison. Potential locations to battle Garnok include:

Pandoria. Unlikely and anticlimactic. It's where he's imprisoned; it is no show of power to wander into someone's cell and take them out with a stab in the back while they are in a weakened, restricted state. (That's not how the Druids think, obviously, but it is how the writers probably think; there's nothing epic about such a defeat.) Garnok's Pandorian residence is also probably heavily guarded by Pandorian beasts and Dark Core goons alike. They gave us trouble trying to rescue Anne, even when they had no use left for her; I doubt they'd let us off easy trying to get to Garnok. Our best hope trying to defeat Garnok in Pandoria would be luring him, and thereby the rest of Dark Core, to us - needless to say, a complicated and dangerous affair where we would run the risk of being the ones to let him loose on Jorvik, should we need to escape and accidentally pull him with us.

Devil's Gap. Severely unlikely and somewhat nonsensical. This used to make perfect sense (at least to me) - the implications that Devil's Gap held high concentrations of evil and danger gave strong associations with Garnok, the greatest evil known to Jorvik. Now that we know Devil's Gap to be the residence of the Vala - known protectors of Jorvik - this seems far likely. Their (most likely brief) alliance with at least one Dark Rider and the Druids' resentment towards them means, to me, that Devil's Gap isn't entirely off the list, but I don't really see it happening unless Dark Core manage bring down the Vala's presumably strong defences to let Garnok loose there. It may be noteworthy, though, that Galloper Thompson (or Gunnar Thrymson, if you prefer) has memories of a great tentacled monster attacking Jarlaheim.

Dark Core's headquarters. Did we ever find out in game what the portal is for? It seems to be dangerous - but at the same time, Katja seemingly appeared from it. In the books, it seems to be a gate to Garnok, or at least his powers. No matter, Dark Core's headquarters are a strong contender in my mind, especially if the battle and its location are out of our control. We may very well have to rush there at the last minute, only to arrive to Garnok already there and ready to wreak havoc on Jorvik the second he is directed towards the coast.

Anywhere by the ocean. Garnok's natural habitat seems to be deep under the sea. It's less likely he'd pop up in a random location than just... at the oil rig - but if Garnok's release is as much out of Dark Core's control as it is ours, rather being entirely of his own volition, he may very well appear anywhere he wishes. This is probably more likely than Mr. Sands believes it to be.

Pine Hill Manor. Wild card of the week! We haven't unlocked it yet, and I'm not sure it's even far south enough to fit within the reaches of the in-game map's greyed out area - in fact, there isn't even any water - but it is Mr. Sands' own personal headquarters. Perhaps it is here he has spent time communicating with, researching, Garnok. Perhaps this, not the oil rig's platform, is the place Garnok sees power (and most of all, vulnerability) in.

All of the above. Garnok, going by the books, seems to be just as much a shapeless, endless presence as he is a physical being. Perhaps the climactic battle will have us attempt and fail to stop his escape, and then follow him around Jorvik in a great race against time and the Dark Riders in an effort to bring an end to him once and for all. Garnok's release would not be a threat only to a small part of Jorvik - it would affect every piece of land and sea. A gameplay representation of that is not all too unlikely.

[sso-montana]

sometimes your characters deserve a little homicide arc as a treat for all the trauma 

[dorianwolfforest]

Creating completely random moodboards and then designing SSO NPCs based on them part 3 / 4

The pen pal

In fifth grade, Linda’s class started a pen pal system around the world, and Linda kept in contact with the girl she wrote to all throughout school. They exchanged stories about their countries, wrote fanfiction about their favorite video games and shows and watched Knights of Unistra together on one of those screensharing sites.

When MC runs into Linda one day, she’s just about to head out to meet her pen pal for the first time. She asks MC to come with her since she’s too nervous to go alone. Just as they’re about to sit down at aideen’s plaza, a Dark Core goon recognizes Linda and starts harassing her. Before anyone can say anything, her sweet, shy pen pal absolutely kicks his ass. 

[centeris2]

16. Stargaze (Anne and Concorde) (SSO December Prompt)

Anne and Concorde reflect on a past night mission. Also on ao3 and wattpad links on profile. Fun Fact: The night mission in the third game was always my favorite aesthetic wise. I just loved the nighttime, the stars, the lighting, it was so pretty. 15 years later I still think night in Jorvik is the most beautiful time in game.

Night time at Jorvik Stables was a quiet time, normally when all the horses were in their stalls or on their way back. It was also when the yard was deserted unless Herman was out for a walk or a stablehand was leaving late. So it was no surprise that no one saw Anne and Concorde leaving, unlocking the entrance gate with a key from Herman and slipping outside.

They didn’t go far, just down the road and along a riding trail a little ways. Concorde only had a halter, Anne not riding with their destination so close, and walked in step with his human. They turned off the dirt path and settled in the grass, Anne setting down a blanket and Concorde getting down for a roll.

“Princess, if you please,” he asked, shaking and presenting himself once he was done scratching his back. She carefully picked and brushed any debris she found on him until he was once more a shining, unblemished silver and white stallion.

“I’d never really noticed the stars until that night, not properly,” Anne said when she settled on her back, looking at the night sky.

“It was a beautiful night, despite the danger,” Concorde recalled. It was when their powers had first awoken, and Derek was attacked and robbed. The batteries of his camera had been lost and scattered in the woods and fields around Jorvik Stables, and Anne and Concorde weren’t the only ones searching. They had to sneak around Dark Core goons scouring the area, racing to find the batteries first. The sky that night was so clear and bright they didn’t need a flashlight, and beat Dark Core to the batteries. Even though they were pumped full of adrenaline they couldn’t help but notice how beautiful it was, especially once they were back at the stable and able to look up to admire.

“I swear I could hear music that night,” Anne admitted, “Like the stars themselves were singing.”

Concorde was quiet for a moment, thinking to himself, before he commented, “humans can’t hear the stars normally, can they.”

Anne blinked, confused. It wasn’t a question, he knew the answer already, but she was bewildered.

“Stars make noise?” she finally asked.

“They sing, humans just don’t know how to listen. Or their ears are too small,” he added the second possibility with a joking tone.

“I had no idea,” Anne mumbled, looking at the stars in a new light. Of course the night sky had music, magic was real so why not? She’s traveled to another dimension, stars singing wasn’t so surprising.

She took in a deep breath, the air crisp and cool, and held it for a moment before letting it out, her focus returning to the sky. The stars were beautiful, the world around her aglow with a soft blue light. The more she looked the more she saw, and she idly wondered which were constellations and which were planets. She connected stars into groups, making her own images as though they were shapes in clouds.

Concorde let out a long sigh as he knelt down, settling on the ground next to her to stargaze with her. They stayed out, watching the sky, until they were cold and numb, bathing in the starlight and marveling at the expanse above them.

[ginnyzero]

Completely Harmless Ch. 45

Completely Harmless An SSO SilverGlade Re-imagining Story (Or Fix it Fan Salt fic) By Ginny O.

When Lily and her friends wanted to buy horses and were directed to the Silverglade Manor and its myriad of problems, they didn’t expect to start a revolution. They were just a bunch a stable girls. Completely harmless. Right?

A/N: Things are only canon if I say they’re canon. Pre-Saving the Moorland Stables compliant for the most part. Posted in its entirety on my website. Posted in 2000 to 4000 word bits here. Rated T for Swearing Word Count 177,577

Chapter Forty-Five She sells sea shells by the ... river shore?

Lily tried to regain control of the meeting. “Pauline, where do we stand on the decorations?”

“Okay, here is the ideas I’ve had with everyone talking. Okay, we take flower wreathes and put them on the lamps and then wrap them with more flowers like the ones in the wreathes and our artificial palm leaves, and the sea shell garlands and sea shell lights. Then, if you have an arm to hang things off of, put a paper lantern with more flowers if you want. Um, don’t choose any flowers that are protected ladies. Then we can use the bubble garlands and the jelly fish lights like we did with the clouds and rainbow hearts from the trees. You can mix them up with the regular paper lanterns too if you want. Put the flower lights, sea shell garlands, and paper lanterns in all the stables. You can make the paper lanterns look like bubbles if you do it right.”

“Like with the clouds.”

“Exactly!”

“Then we can use the beach scene lanterns the exact same way we used the heart lanterns. But you can add the decorated anchors or ship wheels in with them. Or use the shell buckets instead. We put up the boats with the selfie walls, boats have nets decorated with shells, the round white circles have flowers and greenery like they’re a big wreathe. Put up some of the round lanterns, throw in an anchor and a wheel for props if they want. Um,” Pauline scrolled through the pictures. “We can create cabanas for the bar and the dance floor using frames, sheets, the flower lights, the artificial palm leaves, and inside have the jelly fish lanterns and more bubble garlands. The bar can have a net on it and be strewn with the decorated shea shells and the shea shell lights.” Pauline stopped at the giggles.

“Sea shells,” Lily said dryly.

“Sea shells,” Pauline repeated. “We can have more bucket, anchor, wheel decorations on that. And the pineapples, because Lily wants the pineapples. We can put more of the artificial palm leaves there too. Above the bar can go the jelly fish lights and the bubble garlands.” She paused. “And these lace sailboats are cute. We can have them as a prop too at the selfie wall. I mean, I think we’re actually set for decorations. I mean, I know it sounds more than what we had for Rainbow Week, but we’re mixing them in more interesting ways?”

“There are more bigger pieces.”

“And no balloons.”

“Right, I mean, we could use the lantern lights instead of balloons to fill up space or use the jelly fish lights and white lanterns to make little scenes.” Pauline shrugged. “We’ll have to experiment.”

“Food,” Lily moved on.

“Jorvik Crawfish Boil,” Pauline checked her notes. “Crabwiches, fruit salad in a carved watermelon bucket, Vegetable and mushroom skewers, popsicles, watermelon on a stick?”

“One sounds too many.”

Pauline crossed out the watermelons on a stick. It seemed redundant.

“I saw mermaid tail favors. We could put candy in them?”

“We should have cookies, like citrus ones.”

“That means they’d be orange.”

“Orange cookies.”

“I also saw plastic seashell favors, we could put something in those too.”

“I think we better put out some things like pretzels and Cheetos for people like Alex,” Lily said.

“Okay, now we need some drinks because I think we’ve covered food pretty well. And I mean, we can all buy snacks to put in the buckets. That’s not difficult.”

“Pretzels, popcorn, Cheetos, and crisps.”

“Wait, can we really have a bonfire without s’mores, sausages, and potatoes?”

“Yeah, and bread for the sausages or to eat with the crawfish.”

“Cheese, we might need cheese.”

Lily rubbed her forehead. “Fine. But we’ll have to figure out how to split it out. Drinks.”

“I make some really chillax awesome drinks.” Tim spoke up. The first time he’d spoken up in a while. Maybe he was overwhelmed with the eager teenage girls. Or maybe he didn’t care that much about the food or the decorations.

Lily turned her head. “Yeah, I think we might want to test your drinks first.”

“Shibby!”

“Why don’t you tell us the ingredients?” One of the girls asked sweetly.

Tim rattled off his ingredients. They included kidney beans. Kelp. Corn water. Fermented potato juice.

Lily held up a hand. “Fermented potato juice is vodka and corn water is basically moonshine. Are you trying kill us and get us drunk?”

“You don’t think people will like them.”

“I think maybe we should stick to things like banana and strawberry smoothies. Orange juice. And grape and seltzer punch.”

“Apple juice. Watermelon and blueberry spritzers.”

Tim slumped in his seat.

“Those will bring the tourists back for more.” Lily patted his arm.

He sighed. “They sound boring to me.”

“We can try to make them exciting. Package them in fun ways! Mermaid, err, okay without lemons this is not as easy as you’d think.”

“Grape comes in clear.”

“Ohhh, that works. Look we did this at home, just color up some different ice cubes, put edible rainbow glitter around the edge of the glass. Put it in some grape juice with soda if you want, and let the ice cubes melt. Mermaid Cocktail. Or as it was described early grape and seltzer punch.”

“Mock up a white grape sangria too, strawberries, blueberries, apple or orange slices in white grape juice, apple juice, and soda.”

“They can be fun, we promise,” Lily patted his arm again.

Tim sighed. “All right, I’ll have to trust you.”

“Put the orange and soda in hurricane glasses, drizzle strawberry juice into it, garnish in a fun way, sunset hurricane drink.”

“See,” Lily smiled at him.

Tim didn’t look convinced.

“Watermelon and grape go with a lot of things. And we can get you the cucumbers too.”

“Okay, I think we’re good to go.”

“We’ll come up with a recipe list.”

“All right, then we’re doing the different wreathes at the different parties,” Lily said. “Let them have the sand souvenirs. We can do necklace garlands and bracelets to I guess for the luau theme.”

“And hide decorated Conch Shells, because they’re big, and colorful,” Pauline said. “Like, I think these are plastic or vinyl. I hope they are. Real conch shells might be too expensive.”

“Okay,” Lily nodded. “Hedgehogs, you’re the source of the crawfish for the crawfish boil. I’m leaving that to you.”

Riley groaned.

“I know you’d rather have the mermaid favors. Kelsey that sounds like something Madison would enjoy doing.”

“She would. So, we’ll take it.”

“You’re going to have to make a lot of them so, yeah.” Lily wrinkled her nose. She didn’t feel bad about giving that to them and only that. “Bulldogz, I know how you feel about Jamie cooking.”

“Someone is trying to hire her for the Midsummer Feast and thank goodness she’s easily distracted.”

“So, you can have the shell party favors.”

“Sounds like a plan.”

Josefina spoke up. “We’re the source of the strawberries and the blueberries. Do you want us on drinks or on the fruit salad?”

“We’re going to have to buy watermelons in bulk from the food stalls.”

“Okay, question,” Lily put her chin on her hand. “Who among is a competent melon or pumpkin carver? Because they should be the ones doing the fruit salad. I mean, I don’t think the carved bucket idea was a plain bucket?”

The girls got on their phones and started texting people in their clubs.

Loretta shook her head. “None of mine.”

“Loretta, since you have the Midsummer Festival grounds in your area, are you going to do a beach party too?” Lily asked, genuinely curious.

Tan leapt in. “Of course we are, and we’ll decorate those Dark Core containers and chase off the goons if we have to.”

Loretta made a face. “They’ve been stealing. Can you believe it?”

“You don’t say.” Lily’s voice was bland. “Do you have any records of it?” Lily asked. She wasn’t at all surprised that a company with a name like Dark Core hired a thief.

Tan tossed her head. “I recorded everything.”

“Could you send it to Linda?” Lily asked slowly and raised her brow.

“Linda? Why would she want to know? I mean, she’s one of those weird druid riders,” Tan flicked her wrist.

“Because the Baroness will want to know,” Lily said. Frustrated she had to spell it out. “And Linda is her personal assistant and monitors her emails.”

“Oh, in that case, sure,” Tan said and dug out her phone. “As long as the Bobcats get the credit for catching them.”

“I’m sure Linda will tell her.”

Loretta sniffed. “I had them all file reports with Thomas.”

Lily nodded and texted that information to Linda as well.

Linda texted back she was going to ride over to Moorland to get it. She needed to see Alex anyways and she was probably at Maya’s.

“Or with Justin,” Lily murmured. Had Justin gotten up the nerve to say anything to Alex yet? Lily shook her head.

“I’ve got a carver,” Amelia said. “She sent pictures of her work. She can carve buckets and flowers.”

“Then you’re on for the fruit salad,” Lily said. “Do you mind another club coming and picking fruit for the cocktails and the popsicles?”

“Not at all.”

“Chipmunks,” Lily turned to them. “I know you’ve got the farmers, but you also have Harold.”

“Orange slice cookies. On it, Lady Captain Lily.” Kate saluted and then fluttered her hand and bowed.

Lily restrained a sigh. Of course Kate would choose both.

Pauline spoke up. “I think we should take the popsicles, Lady Captain President, we’ve got the big freezers in the Wine Cellar to keep them in.”

“Right, good plan.”

Pia spoke up. “I’ll take one of cocktail slots. That way I can work closely with Tim to make sure they’re fun and fizzy.”

Sonja spoke up. “We also have the other fruits in our forest. So, we’ll take a cocktail slot too. And help everyone harvest fruit.”

Ingrid was next to volunteer. “Ma Anna knows pastry, and croissants like those crabwiches are pastry. We’ll take the crabwiches and make different meat salads for them.”

“Fish salad, chicken salad, egg salad, ham salad,” Violet muttered.

Pauline checked her list, “That leaves the Pandas, the Bulls, and the Cats.”

“What do we have left?”

“Veggie skewers.” Pauline checked. “Snacks, bread and cheese, etc., and more cocktails.”

Loretta spoke quickly. “We can do the Snacks, bread, and cheese and so on. That’s all shopping. We are power shoppers. And none of the stinky stuff from Will’s Mill either.”

Ami wrinkled her nose. “We have a spa. We know cocktails. We’ll help out there and see what we can do with our grapes.”

“That leaves us the Veggie Skewers, and we can get most the produce from the Farmer’s Market and do assembly in Valedale.” Melissa nodded.

Lily spoke up. “This is going to sound crazy, but maybe we should have Courtney Summers do the Midsummer Feast. She’s a local and maybe she knows the local dishes.”

“Barney, Marley, and Carney can cook too,” Kate said. “Or, so says Barney. They have all the traditional recipes.”

“Kate, can you do the invitation thing? I’m sure the Baroness will refuse to invite her personally. But notice, she showed up last time.”

“I’ll invite all of them to do it. Make it a family affair. It’s a week and if we have too much food, well better than none at all.” Kate nodded.

“All right, well, here is hoping that the budget can take this,” Lily said.

“I bet we can get the farmers to donate lots of the supplies,” Kate waved her hands. “It’s for the Midsummer Festival after all.”

“That would be good.”

“We can approach them individually and get back to the group,” Amelie said with a nod.

Luciana spoke up. “I’d like to put a cabana up on the beach near the Dews Farm to be the gathering spot for everyone finishing up their charity events.”

“Splendid plan, Luciana,” Lily nodded. “We can set up one there, and a dance floor and it can be a celebration. At the end of the week, we’ll have all the money. Where are we keeping the money?”

“Silverglade Manor’s safe.”

“Right, we’ll have all the money and can present Maya with a big fake check. And I hope that will be enough to get them out of their debts and back on their farm.”

“They’re in foreclosure,” Loretta sighed. “Not bankruptcy. I had to go over it with her three times.”

“If they’re in foreclosure, that’s easier than bankruptcy to an extent. Though what did they do? Take a loan out on their farm?”

“From G.E.D. instead of a bank.” Loretta pushed her hair back behind her neck.

“Well, Ms. Drake is going to take the cash or else I’ll shove it where the sun don’t shine,” Lily muttered.

“Make it super public,” one of the girls said. “She can’t be a monster in front of a lot of people.”

“Ms. Drake?” Amelia asked.

Josefina snorted.

“It’s worth a try.”

“We’re going to have to do the same thing for the stables once it happens.” Ginny said.

“Have they tried anything but threats?”

“No. But the stable is in debt. To the bank, not to them, praise Aideen. But if the bank forecloses on the property, we’ll all be kicked out. Though your plans with the Friesians have been working. And Mr. Kemball has started on the Riding Arena. We’ve been having to keep him honest.”

“That must be a job and a half.”

“Like keeping James honest,” Pia said.

There was some nervous laughter.

“All right, Mares, Frogs, Squirrels, Terriers, and Kittens,” Lily said. “Get your areas in order. Your job is to focus on your section of South New Jorvik County and come enjoy the Midsummer Beach Party when it’s on. If you have problems with G.E.D. or Dark Core, report to me or to Linda.”

Pauline interrupted. “Music, Lily. Music!”

“Well, Fort Pinta will have DJ Kai. And I know New Hillcrest will have Syntax.”

“We’ve got a pretty big beach with a lot of islands all picked out.”

“I think asking Mr. Wetton for thirteen acts again is a bit too soon. Plus, it would make Rainbow Week less special.”

“Radio the different music the DJs are doing.” One of the girls suggested. “Set up a transmitter. Jack it through that tower in the Grey Mountains that G.E.D. has set up and it should get the entire county. Or stream it online.”

“That’s devious, and I like it.” Lily grinned.

“They shouldn’t have an obnoxious radio tower that big up there anyways. Radio towers can be much more discreet. I mean, put one on the observatory and it won’t be a blight to the landscape.” There was a sniff.

Lily turned to Pauline. “Happy?”

“Syntax can hack the tower,” Ginny said.

“Yes, keep them hacking for the greater good.” Lily smirked.

Kate shouted. “Okay, pizza time!”

They were all hungry. And there were new people to meet. So, they had pizza and wings and loaded potatoes and talked to each other and Tim. Though they all agreed Tim was quite strange and was it college or something else?

They split up.

FOR THE ACCOMPANYING IMAGES PLEASE DO NOT REMOVE MY WATERMARK AND CONTACT INFORMATION. THANK YOU. I get it. Some of you might get excited and want to see this stuff in the game, especially the clothes, tack, and pets. However, the only way I want to see this in the game is if I get paid for it. If I see it in the game and I’m not paid for it, there will be hell to pay. You think I’m salty. I’d be angry. Personally, I’m not going to send this info to SSO. If you do, leave my contact information there! Don’t give them any excuses to steal.

Now, I’ll know you haven’t read this note if you leave me comments about how ‘salty’ I am about the game and if I hate it so much I should do something else. I am doing something else. It’s called Mystic Riders MMORPG Project. Mystic Riders however is a very baby phase game. You can check out our plans on the game dev blog. (Skills, Factions, Professions, Crafting, Mini-Games, 25+ horse breeds!) If you know anyone who would be interested and has money or contacts about game making, direct them to the blog.

[space-unicorn-dot]

Star Stable Music Reviews: Starshine Legacy

Big hint: I’m going to attempt to do the thing, so smack me if this is actually interesting to some of you and I forget to continue because I can do stupid stuff like that forgetting things I want to do sometimes. Or I just get anxiety about how I want it to come out because I play with things too much in my head and then never actually write things down.

Ehhem! Welcome to my brand new shitpost series! I mean, Star Stable Music Reviews! Please remember that I’m doing this for fun. I’ve never actually studied the concept of music in anything besides mandatory grade school classes, so this isn’t necessarily a technical analysis, though some elements I’ve heard of may find their way into these writings occasionally. Whatever I think, I’mma smack down. Some of these will just be me oohing and ahhing over how pretty it sounds, and some might include some story-related elements. If you have not yet unlocked areas, I would suggest avoiding posts relating to the albums of that area. Most are conveniently titled after their area (IE, Epona) and therefore easily avoidable since I’ll put the album title in the post title. Others, like their album “Races” may be harder to determine. If there are any specific notes about things, I’ll try to include them in this top section of posts if it’s a full-album thing, or in the beginning of the specific track’s section.

So, without further ado, the first album I’ll be reacting to is my good, old friend, the music of Starshine Legacy! If ye be new around these parts, Starshine Legacy was a part of my childhood and I, thankfully, have managed to retain all four of the games and the cases of two of them. Somewhere along the line, I lost the case to Episodes One and Two, but that’s alright. They might be really old and the WASD and mouse controls might drive me a little nuts sometimes, but I still love them.

And, boy, do I love the music of Starshine Legacy.

“DEVINE FRIENDS”

Yes, it is actually spelled that way. Yes, I only just noticed. Yes, it drives me a little nuts, but also makes me think of Vines, but, no, unfortunately (fortunately), this track has nothing to do with Vines.

This is an actual classic of Starshine Legacy, a classic of the Soul Riders, the kind of music I think of when I think of the Soul Riders. This plays in the opening message of the Starshine Legacy games over a rotating view of the Secret Stone Circle. It feeds into the sort of mystery and fantasy elements of the game and sets a good tone for that kind of atmosphere, especially when thrown on top of the Stone Circle. I believe it also plays over the end credits of the game or over the start screen, and, to be quite honest, I’ve sat for a few extra minutes on the home screen after playing through the game just because it adds to the energy of the story I just experienced. This track also captures some of the action and adventure of the girls’ story. Definitely one of my favorite tracks of... all time, actually? I guess since these games were such a part of my childhood, it’s just something I easily recognize, and it never fails to get me in a good, excited mood.

“FIRST DAY IN SCHOOL”

In this track’s piece, I will be referencing Golden Hills. If you would not like to hear about this area for spoilers’ sake, please skip this track.

The standard track of the Jorvik High School and also why I was on the edge of my seat when I first unlocked Golden Hills and Cape West Fishing Village. I believe I saw it mentioned somewhere else that this is a track often associated with discoveries in the Starshine Legacy game that were important to the story, so, by association, I was ready to discover something deep and interesting in Cape West. While Pi the Witch and the Dark Horses were certainly an important development in our story, they weren’t directly tied with this music and the main village, so I never made such a connection and may have been a little disappointed that nothing happened in the village. >.>

In hindsight and after some experience with the village, I see how this track may align with the vibe of the village. As a fishing village, there’s plenty going on (even if you have to imagine most of it). There’s some dock workers actually roaming around, their sailors there on break from their cruises, it’s one of the most expensive places to shop in all of Jorvik and has some pretty desirable gear for it, naturally, fishing, and ferries cruise in from Jarlaheim and Fort Pinta, bringing loads of supplies and eager travelers (and people who just want to train their horses) alike. Jorvik High School had this same sort of “busy energy” vibe going on with the students milling about, going from class to class, idling in the halls with their friends, etc. So, while it’s a bit of a missed opportunity on a thing SSO seems to be good at (more on this later) in associating the same sort of rhythm or musical pattern in different tones, it’s not a super bad choice for the village.

“INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX”

Minor spoiler alert for Dark Core activities in the Valedale Lake area contained in this piece.

The classic track of Dark Core and the Generals of Garnok. This track is prominent at Dark Core locations. In Episode One, this was the track of the DC Barricade, where Lisa had to venture to save Starshine from Mr. Sands and Dark Core. In Episode Three, it appeared again on DC’s base off the coast (not unlike the oil rig a la SSO), seeing Mr. Sands welcoming Jessica through the portal and, again, as thematically Dark Core/Garnok’s Generals. While featuring heavily on hard, industrial sounds, as the name suggests, the track also repeats some of the fantasy elements integral to the game’s story. It also capitalizes on creating the sense of action and pressing times in the story. This is another easily identifiable track of Starshine Legacy. Of course, since it’s such a signature track, the them was, thankfully, kept in-tact. If I’m not mistaken, this theme may be heard in Dark Core’s mini-base above Vale Lake.

“SEARCHING FOR CLUES”

Actually, I might be slightly mistaken for calling the “First Day at School” track the one commonly used for important discoveries because this is truly the track that takes that role prominently. It is similar to the aforementioned track, but differs in tone. Some darker, more ominous and mysterious elements are present here. For example, I believe this is the track playing over the Library at Night level in Episode One as Lisa learns more of Mr. Sands and Dark Core from Linda’s research while Lisa was at the stable meeting Starshine.

“STONEHENGE”

As you may have guessed, this is another track tied with the Secret Stone Circle. It’s a very short piece presented as the Circle is discovered by the four girls and captures the mystery and awe of the location.With its place in the story and relation to this location, it is another identifiable and standout track from the original series.

“THE LEGACY OF STARSHINE”

The longest track of this album clocks in at just shy of eight minutes. As is common throughout the rest of this music, it is a variation of “Devine Friends,” softer and in a slightly different tone. While “Devine Friends” opens and closes the episodes, this is the variation that truly lays over the home screen of the games. It actually goes on to incorporate a variation of other tracks present from the game and a segment that is probably recognizable to SSO players as a variation of the race music common in many of Jorvik’s current races.

“VANISHED”

Another track of mystery and discovery, “Vanished” plays with elements and themes of some of the other tracks to bring the music of the levels where the Soul Riders prepare to face a challenge. If my memory hasn’t failed me, this is the music that sees Lisa off to the DC Barricade after Starshine is taken by Dark Core goons, and possibly (stretching my memory here) Anne when she must rescue Concorde. This track plays with suspense and the action of the pending challenges in the story while staying true to the mysterious and fantasy-oriented nature of the games.

“WINNER’S CIRCLE”

The final track of the album, and fittingly so because this is the track that sees us out of every episode. The final level of each game, barring the fourth game, is a competition the girls have been training to partake in. Lisa races on Starshine against Sabine in Episode One, Linda beats her in a Show Jumping Competition in Episode Two, and Anne participates in a Dressage Competition. When you’ve completed the course successfully and won, this music will celebrate your heroic victory and your success in the ring. Fun fact: the confetti that falls over the finish of the Championships is a hat-tip to the confetti that celebrates your win with this track in the main games, as it falls over you (as the Soul Rider of the Episode) and their Soul Steed as the episode is concluded.

OVERALL

Part of what makes this such an enjoyable album is because these tracks paired up nicely in a game. No, the graphics and control mechanics didn’t age well, but I, personally, feel that these tracks did a good job paired with what was going on in the games. They carry a theme to build with the story and match with one another and have never felt out of place in the game, in my experience. I’ve replayed the games several times and still have yet to tire of these tracks. If you are interested in full play-throughs of the Starshine Legacy games, feel free to message me so I can send you a link to the folder of my recordings in my Google drive. They are straight-through runs without breaking up by levels/chapters and do not intentionally have any commentary, though I realized after that they may have picked up some sound because I wasn’t aware my screen recording software could also pick up my voice. Episode Four, in particular, probably has some random recording of my screen at the very end because my recorder did a weird, so I had to fight with it to get it to stop recording.

[heretic-altias]

SSO Bad Ending

If it was possible to fail sso, this is how I’d imagine it goes. I actually almost cried writing this, I could relate to the emotions.

I shifted uneasily on Midnight’s back. This was it. Anne had finally regained enough strength to join us in battle, and now we were off to defeat Dark Core once and for all. Midnight fidgeted underneath me, sensing the fear nobody wanted to admit they had. “It’ll be ok pal” I whispered reassuringly, patting his neck. “I can sense your fear. Theirs too. This won’t be easy” he replied quietly. “It won’t” I agreed “but we’ll win” Our previously stolen barge finally approached Dark Core’s base. “This is it” Alex said “be ready”. The plan was simple. Sneak up to the portal platform when we knew they were meeting there, and attack. In action, it would be much harder. Midnight shifted nervously as we stopped. I patted his neck again, but it didn’t make a difference. I was just as nervous. Anything could happen out there. We snuck through easily. None of the goons were around. “Where are they” Linda mumbled from the back. Linda’s powers weren’t really meant for battle, but she’s taken an ancient looking sword from the Druids and insisted she’d be fine. It had a moon symbol on it, which made me wonder about it’s origin. She’d proved she was able to use it, so we’d reluctantly agreed to bring her into battle when it was clear she wouldn’t stay back no matter what we said. Where she’d learned sword fighting and when, I have no idea. “There they are” Lisa whispered loudly when the portal area came into sight. Yet as we approached we knew something was off. All the goons were with them, and nothing was going on. They weren’t doing anything other then talking, so why were they all there? The goons weren’t needed at meetings like this one. The Dark Riders were all mounted too. Something was really wrong. “Something is off” Linda said, voicing my exact thoughts. “Can’t turn back now” Alex replied. She was right, we were too far in to go back. It was all or nothing now, we had to act before they retrieved the last Dark Rider. “I’ll fly around and attack from the other side, that should grab their attention. Then you guys all charge in” I suggested. The original plan was to all go in together, but if I could draw the goons away it would help. “I don’t know, you could be shot down” Alex said. “It’s the best strategy, we can’t charge all of them like that” Linda told her. They debated for another minute, but I knew I’d won. If Linda agreed with me they all would cave eventually. Sure enough after a moment, Alex reluctantly stepped aside letting me past. I picked up a slow canter and leapt over the rail on the edge of the path. Midnight free fell for a brief moment before wings, the same color as his brown coat, appeared with a flash of energy. One flap, and we were steady and heading right over to the back side. We approached a bit below it, so we weren’t seen right away. “You ready?” I asked Midnight. This was the final reprieve before it started. “No, but it’s now or never” he replied. “We’ll be fine” I assured him. “Just be careful” he sighed “I can’t bear to lose you” I hugged his neck tightly. “We can do this” I told him “then we’ll go out to that cafe you love the fries at so much” “Alright” he said. “Let’s do this” I added, with one final rub on his neck. We shot straight upward, and I immediately blasted fire like Lisa could. There were benefits to having all four powers, I had an entire arsenal of magical attacks. I had been told right before leaving that I was somehow connected to Aideen, and that’s why I had all four. I still wasn’t sure how. All attention turned to us. Well, almost all. Sabine looked to the main path, the way the others were coming. They charged down, and immediately had to narrowly dodge Sabine’s fire. I couldn’t watch them after that, I had my own battle to fight. I hit goon after goon with Soul Strike, before coming face to face with Katja. I had an advantage with Midnight’s wings though, and he knocked her off her horse. I hit her with a Soul Strike, and she stumbled back on the impact. We were still near the edge, and to my surprise she stumbled right off, into the sea. Her horse leapt after her, in a futile attempt to save her. Did I just kill her? I thought suddenly to myself, the idea bothering me. “No idea, think about it later” Midnight, who could hear my thoughts, replied. I shook my head and focused back on the battle at hand. Midnight was right, I couldn’t focus on that now. Alex managed to knock Jessica unconscious, and her horse was guarding her. Alex moved on to some goons, and the horse ignored her. The area near Linda was a mess. She was the only one whose weapon drew blood really. I had to focus really hard to not puke at the metallic smell. Of course, then it went wrong. The portal flashed and out came Darko, followed by an unfamiliar girl. I didn’t have time to get a good look at her. He took one look at the the scene, before lunging towards the closest rider, Linda. He slammed into Meteor, with enough force to knock Linda off his back. Her sword skidded away from her, and came to rest inches from the edge. Seeing she needed help, I dove in there. I managed to grab her in the nick of time. Meteor saw she was safe and dashed off back towards the barge. I started to take Linda there, figuring we could drop her with Meteor and rejoin the fight, when suddenly some kind of energy blast hit Midnight in the wing. I quickly identified the unknown girl as the source. We barely managed to avoid hitting the water, crashing on to the platform edge instead. I immediately leapt to my feet, knowing Midnight needed a moment to get up. To my surprise, instead of attacking me, she lunged at Midnight, dodging past me to do so. “Midnight!” I shouted, but the poor stallion had only just gotten to his feet. She stabbed his neck with a hidden dagger, and he let out an ear piercing cry. I felt his pain through our bond, and in a move of pure instinct jumped on to the girl’s back. I lit my one hand on fire, burning her shoulder, and grabbed for the dagger with the other. Yet this girl clearly had experience, she grabbed my arm with her free hand and flipped me over. I landed right on Midnight, who cried out from the pain. She then shoved us both over the edge. “Jacqueline!” I heard Linda yell. That meant she was ok at least. Midnight desperately attempted to fly us up, but one wing was burned from the energy blast, and I think the other was broken from when I was flipped on top of him. “I’m sorry” the horse said in my thoughts. “It wasn’t you” I replied, also mentally. We hit the icey water in slow motion it seemed. I held Midnight’s neck, and desperately attempted to drag him up to no avail. He was losing a lot of blood, and the salt water didn’t help. I could feel him slipping away. “No, don’t leave” I begged him mentally, despite knowing there was nothing I could do. “I’m sorry” I then told him “I shouldn’t have taken you here” “It was our last chance” he told me weakly “we had to fight today” At this point we had drifted quite far down. I gave one last futile kick upward before knowing I couldn’t do anything. “Go” he begged “leave me and go, you can swim up on your own. At least then you’ll stand a chance” “No, I’m not leaving you” I said, tears forming in my eyes. Those words had been quieter. He was fading away. I was losing him. “I love you” I told him, hugging his neck closer. “I love you too” he replied in just barely a whisper. I felt our bond break. Time seemed to completely stop. I didn’t even notice I was running out of air. I refused to let go of his neck. I felt numb inside. I watched the light above us fade away. I’ll see you on the other side I thought as everything faded to black.

Our story was over.

[natduskfall]

Forgot i took this screenshot. Dark Core goon my beloved

[writingonjorvik]

Can We Discuss Defeating Garnok?

I’ve been talking a lot about how I think that Garnok’s defeat needs to be the end of chapter one of SSO’s story, but I haven’t really explained why I feel like that’s the case. So, let’s talk about that.

Let’s knock this one off the bat first, cause it’s the simplest reason. SSO is an MMO, and while SSO’s narrative is not a traditional MMO experience, MMO narratives are more in like with serial series/monster of the week kind of stories that one big bad. This has a lot to do with expansions in most MMOs cases, but it’s also in part to how big MMOs are. The scale of MMOs typically cover planets, and so to be fighting the same big bad for the entirety of a story tends to get repetitive, while also limiting the scope of the world the the devs can use instead of creating new enemies and challenges in new regions of their massive world.

Which leads well into my next point, because before I do that, I need to address a counterpoint. It was pointed out by someone on the WOJ Discord that while Garnok was the major big bad, there were a load of generals in the way that should be serving as the stepping stones between the players and the final fight with Garnok, so the generals would be serving as those “expansion” bosses. Which is a fair point, if that was being used in application.

However, I think this route is also really risky, for the same issue of repetition, but also the fact that we should have beaten one of the generals by now. And we haven’t. 9 years in and we haven’t finished off any big bad, not even in a “purified the darkness” kind of way where they’re still alive but not evil. And that’s not going into the whole problem with the generals: they reincarnate. If Garnok stays the end game big bad, we’re going to keep the same generals through the end of the game. And that runs a high risk of being stale because we’ll be fighting the same group of people for as long as SSO’s around, characters that will keep one-upping us and we’ll keep one-upping them in a never ending loop instead of meeting new characters and figuring out how we’re going to defeat them each time around. Not to mention, these are thousands of year old demons, they aren’t going to evolve and adapt like more human enemies, which runs the risk, again, of conflicts with them being stale. Mr. Sands will always be the same on the big scale, he’s never going to grow and become more dynamic. Which means we’ll be head first in the same fight over and over until the game ends.

This is why the monster of the week trope works in MMOs, just it’s more of a monster of the month system. It is technically the same trope, but at least there’s progression forward and you’re not being thwarted by the same five goons over and over again. You may meet other cosmic horrors, but those cosmic horrors have a different flavor and a different method to defeat them. Or it’s not a cosmic horror, it’s a bunch of power hungry goons who got their hands on a very powerful source of magic. But the ability to move between different types of enemies, even if the core steps are the same, helps hide those strings in how the characters are being moved to your real big bad.

But that leads to my biggest reason, and it kinda leads back to why I think the Soul Riders need to break up. I’ll try not to repeat this point too much, but the Garnok fight is their fight, not our fight. When Starshine Legacy was recent, I could get more of why people would want to be a part of that story, but we’ve all had a moment I’m sure where we’ve noticed that the plot of SSO is basically shoehorning in an important fifth rider to keep the story going. It’s one of the reasons the MC being part of their group doesn’t work too. And while I understand the need to retcon the SSL games into the new book series, in a lot of ways this makes the problem worse on the Garnok fight being the Soul Riders fight.

Part of this comes to multimedia storytelling, which I personally adore. However, the risk of multimedia storytelling is accepting that it will gatekeep part of your audience. The SSL games, even if SSO couldn’t redistribute them, were easier. You’re playing a game, so you’d play another game, or watch someone play another game. But books get harder. Books require a different type of attention, and they can keep out people with visual and focusing disabilities. Not to mention that it severely limits people who can read them because of language having to be released in print, where as a game could be modded by fans to have a language patch (Star Academy had this recently). And it’s not as easy to have a readalong of the books, cause that opens its own can of worms around copyright. So while it makes sense that the books needed to be made to solve the issue of SSL becoming less accessible, the problem doesn’t get entirely resolved because the books are still being gatekept from a lot of the players, and this is the foundation story of SSO. Which means that attachment to the Soul Riders that would make jumping into their story enjoyable is still just as inaccessible as it is with the SSL games being out of production.

Now for the issues in the story itself, I haven’t read the whole trilogy, my Swedish isn’t that good yet, so I don’t know how the sealing away of Garnok was resolved in the books. But basing this on SSL, Garnok is defeated by the end of the games. The Soul Riders succeed in locking him away for another generation of Soul Riders. And not just “he’s locked away, but we’ve still got to fight” kinda way. No, he’s in there. The game says that Jorvik is safe and the fights over for now. That’s the end of him for some 20+ years.

So when SSO rolls around and undoes that, it makes the Soul Riders look incompetent because they didn’t actually seal away Garnok. They couldn’t even keep Garnok locked away for presumably four-ish years (they’re starting high school in SSL and they’re presumably going into college now, so that’s my guess). And I know the game talks about how it’s been getting harder to hold back Garnok for a while, but the last Soul Rider group, which we know was fractured with Catherine now and was also dealing with that getting harder to defeat Garnok bit, still managed to keep Garnok sealed away for 20+ years. The current team couldn’t even managed a fifth of that. Which seeds that they’re even less capable than a broken team of Soul Riders. Not a good impression.

Which means narratively, the story needs to make the current Soul Riders feel competent again. And the only way for them to overcome such a massive failure of letting Garnok get out after less than four years is to go further than any other Soul Riders before them, which is defeating Garnok and moving the story into other places that aren’t forcing the issues I listed above by making players relate to a story they may not even be able to access and experience. 

It just, there’s so much about the current story that traps the Soul Riders in a cycle that risks running old and making them look incapable, while also shoehorning in solutions to why this is an MMO now. If the story though is willing to end the Garnok plot though, then the Soul Riders can just be the solution the druids went to to deal with the Garnok problem, and now they need to look at the MC at the problems that get opened up after. Garnok’s defeat makes this story so far the epilogue climax to the Soul Rider story and not a continuation of a story that was wrapped up.

[twracehorse]

More fun while watching Z play Starshine Legacy

Are these the power puff girls??

Party at Herman’s!

Lisa and Anne go out of the stable together and Lisa never makes it to the group

Z: “Where did Lisa go?” Me: “OMG JOSH TOOK HER”

We haven’t seen Josh at all in the game AND THERE HE IS FOR THE FINALE!!

Moved on to the fourth game

Alex using the soul strike on the goons and they make a loud grunting

Z: “It’s so loud like they’re sensationally whisper in my ear”

Alex is then running and a goon is behind her chasing after her

Z screams in terror XD

Found out that the portal on the Dark Core base leads to the ship under the sea that holds Garnok due to Mr. Sands saying “that girl and horse kicked me back into the ship” (Anne and Concorde kicking Mr. Sands and Jessica into the hell portal)

Mr. Sands in a wheelchair was stuck in a green pool of sludge and I’m pretty sure he wasn’t supposed to be XD

Wook at his gwumpy wittle face

Stalker is the best stalker, he doesn’t blink or breath or move to give away his position

In Pandoria doing the seal breaking with Alex 

Z: “Where are my downward mushrooms?”

@sso-zelda-dusknight

[centeris2]

Over 100 prompts and counting written for users (and anons) from tumblr.

As these are no longer on tumblr I figured I needed them somewhere so I didn’t lose them forever.

stormiesquall asked: 1 for the micro story thing 1 - don’t leave

SSL

The Star fell into Pandoria, and The Sun looked out into the pink swirls, ecstatic that after all this time she would finally be saved from her prison. But time continued to pass, and Lisa did not come. Anne tried to connect to her, tried to get a message to her, but Lisa could not hear her. She did not know what had brought Lisa to Pandoria, but she found herself shouting into the abyss, willing her voice to carry through the nothingness to her friend. She didn’t want to be alone anymore, and even if it meant Lisa was in trouble and trapped like she was Anne couldn’t help but be glad that she wasn’t by herself anymore.

And then one day very much like all the others, Anne felt a ripple. There was someone new on the other side, someone whose magic could somehow touch Pandoria, and this person was forcing the seams apart to get to Lisa. In Anne’s desperation to not be alone she ran to the edge of her floating rock, shouting and sobbing and trying to reach out to Lisa. But the only thing to keep her company was the echo:

“Don’t leave.”

---

SSO

Day 2 - Rebecca wasn’t sure if it was actually day 2 or not, but she thought it might help her remain sane if she tried to keep a record in her head. She was starting to regret agreeing to sneak back onto the Dark Core base to search for the Book, and not just because her blood was splattered on the floor.

Day 5 - Surely the Druids were looking for her, they knew where she was. Alex, Linda, and Lisa together had enough magic for a quick rescue mission, right? They could even use the walk on water trick, Lisa with the harp and Linda or Alex with the Fragment of Aideen’s Light to run across the ocean. It was smart of the Druids to insist that she leave it behind in case of capture.

Day 6 - She needed to escape, and Justin was too afraid of his grandfather to help, even if he insisted that he was sorry for the sessions he put her through. And she couldn’t count on the Druids to rescue her before Dark Core broke her and turned her to their side.

Day 7 - Turns out she didn’t need Midnightwarrior nearby for her to generate lighting.

Day 8 - There was a storm raging outside, she could feel the static on her skin. Her body ached and her empty stomach clenched, and her wrists burned from the molten steel melting down her skin. All the hurt focused on the lighting in her hands burned hot enough to melt her chains until she dropped to the ground. The lock on the door was similarly destroyed, and she ran as fast as her damaged body could mange. Her rage blazed and she no longer valued the lives of the Dark Core goons standing in her way. When one more hand grabbed her before she could steal a ship she turned, hand shining with electricity held inches from her assailant’s face.

“Don’t leave,” Justin begged. After everything he had done to her, all the blood and screams he had forced out of her he had the audacity to look at her with fear that she would be the one to hurt him. It had taken her blood and bile and tears to make him see Dark Core for what they were.

“Come with me.”

[centeris2]

Rebecca sat on the beach near the Golden Hills stable, looking out over the waves she had crossed earlier that day. There was a lot on her mind, what with Dark Core and Justin, and it hadn’t all set in yet. She had removed Midnightwarrior’s tack, and he had happily bucked a few times and rolled in the sand. But after that he had stood next to her, watching the ocean with her. Most evenings when they were done for the day he would wander off a ways to graze, but tonight he stuck close to her side.

The dark stallion occasionally breathed on her, blowing her hair as though to make sure she was still there before lifting his head again.

Out there, somewhere, was the Dark Core Drill platform that Mr Sands and the others were on. She couldn’t quite believe that this was all real, it seemed more like a dream or a movie than reality. Rebecca couldn’t remember a time in her life when she was as scared as she had been when she had to watch Midnightwarrior get loaded up and taken away. She was sure that she was going to be caught by one of the goons and unceremoniously thrown off the platform and into the ocean to her death. But somehow she had managed to not get caught and escape with her life, and her horse, as well as valuable information that the druids would need to hear. For now it seemed that Justin was not going to want to be rescued, as it had sounded like he had his memories tampered with. She wondered how she was supposed to fight an enemy that could manipulate minds, who knew what else Dark Core could do.

Midnightwarrior gave her a nudge, not happy that she seemed lost in thought. She idly scratched his nose until he gave her a harder shove, completely knocking her over.

“Hey! What was that for?” she asked from the ground. The horse pawed the sand and nosed her face and stomach, making her giggle. He knew she was upset, but more importantly he had been worried about her too. He hadn’t liked being locked away from her, unable to help her, and he knew his human felt guilt that she had used him as bait. But now he was able to make her laugh and shove him away. The horse snorted and pranced into the water before bouncing back to her in a trot. She rolled her eyes but tossed her shoes and socks away. He tucked in one leg and extended the other so that she did not need anything to help her mount him, and with her on his back he stood and walked into the water.

“Alright, what do you want to do?” her horse answered by cantering through the waves along the beach, taking her from the ocean side of the side to the eastern side that faced the cliffs. To her surprise he galloped and left into the water, pleased that his human was laughing on his back, her fingers tightly gripping his mane as he swam to a small beach. The girl recognized the beach, but not because she had been on it before. She had seen it from the stable island and had wondered how to get over to it, it wasn’t connected to the shore near the bridge to Cape West Fishing Village. But the faithful steed did not stop at the beach, he continued carrying her up a path up the side of the cliff until he stopped at the top. It was a grassy location, flat with a few trees and the remains of a camp fire stop. There was also a large cave, and she wondered if there were any supplies in there, like flint to start a fire.

With Midnightwarrior stopped, she slid off of him, looking out over the ocean from the higher vantage point. She couldn’t help but smile, the sun was almost set and the stars were just starting to come out. To her left she could see the fishing village, lights slowly coming on in windows as the sunlight faded. She rubbed her horse’s neck and gave him a kiss before she sat down once more.

“Thanks for bringing me here,” she told him. He snorted in response, looking up at the sky and the appearing stars before he began to graze. Rebecca cracked a smile at that before she leaned back, resting in the grass and looking up at the stars. She would deal with Dark Core and the approaching end of the world tomorrow, for now she just wanted to enjoy this.