#tools for developers

[prabirdutta]

[physalian]

How To Make Your Writing Less Stiff 5

Movement

Dredging this back up from way back.

Make sure your characters move, but not too much during heavy dialogue scenes. E.g. two characters sitting and talking—do humans just stare at each other with their arms lifeless and bodies utterly motionless during conversation? No? Then neither should your characters. Make them…

Gesture

Wave

Frown

Laugh

Cross their legs/their arms

Shift around to get comfortable

Pound the table

Roll their eyes

Point

Shrug

Touch their face/their hair

Wring their hands

Pick at their nails

Yawn

Stretch

Sniff/sniffle

Tap their fingers/drum

Bounce their feet

Doodle

Fiddle with buttons or jewelry

Scratch an itch

Touch their weapons/gadgets/phones

Check the time

Get up and sit back down

Move from chair to tabletop

The list goes on.

Bonus points if these are tics that serve to develop your character, like a nervous fiddler, or if one moves a lot and the other doesn’t—what does that say about the both of them? This is where “show don’t tell” really comes into play.

As in, you could say “he’s nervous” or you could show, “He fidgets, constantly glancing at the clock as sweat beads at his temples.”

This site is full of discourse on telling vs showing so I’ll leave it at that.

Epithets

In the Sci-fi WIP that shall never see the light of day, I had a flashback arc for one male character and his relationship with another male character. On top of that, the flashback character was a nameless narrator for Reasons.

Enter the problem: How would you keep track of two male characters, one who you can't name, and the other who does have a name, but you can’t oversaturate the narrative with it? I did a few things.

Nameless Narrator (written in 3rd person limited POV) was the only narrator for the flashback arc. I never switched to the boyfriend’s POV.

Boyfriend had only a couple epithets that could only apply to him, and halfway through their relationship, NN went from describing him as “the other prisoner” to “his cellmate” to “his partner” (which was also a double entendre). NN also switched from using BF’s full name to a nickname both in narration and dialogue.

BF had a title for NN that he used exclusively in dialogue, since BF couldn’t use his given name and NN hadn’t picked a new one for himself.

Every time the subject of the narrative switched, I started a new paragraph so “he” never described either character ambiguously mid-paragraph.

Is this an extreme example? Absolutely, but I pulled it off according to my betas.

The point of all this is this: Epithets shouldn’t just exist to substitute an overused name. Epithets de-personalize the subject if you use them incorrectly. If your narrator is thinking of their lover and describing that person without their name, then the trait they pick to focus on should be something equally important to them. In contrast, if you want to drive home how little a narrator thinks of somebody, using depersonalizing epithets helps sell that disrespect.

Fanfic tends to be the most egregious with soulless epithets like "the black-haired boy" that tell the reader absolutely nothing about how the narrator feels about that black-haired boy, espeically if they're doing so during a highly-emotional moment.

As in, NN and BF had one implied sex scene. Had I said “the other prisoner” that would have completely ruined the mood. He’s so much more than “the other prisoner” at that point in the story. “His partner,” since they were both a combat team and romantically involved, encompassed their entire relationship.

The epithet also changed depending on what mood or how hopeless NN saw their situation. He’d wax and wane over how close he believed them to be for Reasons. NN was a very reserved character who kept BF at a distance, afraid to go “all in” because he knew there was a high chance of BF not surviving this campaign. So NN never used “his lover”.

All to say, epithets carried the subtext of that flashback arc, when I had a character who would not talk about his feelings. I could show you the progression of their relationship through how the epithets changed.

I could show you whenever NN was being a big fat liar about his feelings when he said he's not in love, but his narration gave him away. I could show you the exact moment their relationship shifted from comrades to something more when NN switched mid-paragraph from "his cellmate" to "his partner" and when he took up BF's nickame exclusively in the same scene.

I do the same thing in Eternal Night when Elias, my protagonist, stops referring to Dorian as "it" and "the vampire" instead of his name the moment they collide with a much more dangerous vampire, so jarringly that Elias notices in his own narration—the point of it being so explicit is that this degredation isn't automatic, it's something he has to conciously do, when everyone else in his clan wouldn't think twice about dehumanizing them.

—

Any literary device should be used with intent if you want those layers in your work. The curtains are rarely just blue. Whether it’s a simile with a deliberate comparison or an epithet with deliberate connotations, your readers will pick up on the subtext, I promise.

[whump-in-the-closet]

characters who’s identity revolves around their purpose, defined by something or someone else. By the prophecies, by their service; the lapdog, the weapon, the chosen one. And then there’s a moment of softness, a complete breach and utterly human— they cradle their head in their hands, they bend to pick up a cat and hold it tight, they slump against someone’s shoulder, completely trusting for the first time

thank you that’s it. exits stage and screams.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Canada’s ground-breaking, hamstrung repair and interop laws

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/11/15/radical-extremists/#sex-pest

When the GOP trifecta assumes power in just a few months, they will pass laws, and those laws will be terrible, and they will cast long, long shadows.

This is the story of how another far-right conservative government used its bulletproof majority to pass a wildly unpopular law that continues to stymie progress to this day. It's the story of Canada's Harper Conservative government, and two of its key ministers: Tony Clement and James Moore.

Starting in 1998, the US Trade Rep embarked on a long campaign to force every country in the world to enact a new kind of IP law: an "anticircumvention" law that would criminalize the production and use of tools that allowed people to use their own property in ways that the manufacturer disliked.

This first entered the US statute books with the 1998 passage of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), whose Section 1201 established a new felony for circumventing an "access control." Crucially, DMCA 1201's prohibition on circumvention did not confine itself to protecting copyright.

Circumventing an access control is a felony, even if you never violate copyright law. For example, if you circumvent the access control on your own printer to disable the processes that check to make sure you're using an official HP cartridge, HP can come after you.

You haven't violated any copyright, but the ink-checking code is a copyrighted work, and you had to circumvent a block in order to reach it. Thus, if I provide you a tool to escape HP's ink racket, I commit a felony with penalties of five years in prison and a $500k fine, for a first offense. So it is that HP ink costs more per ounce than the semen of a Kentucky Derby-winning stallion.

This was clearly a bad idea in 1998, though it wasn't clear how bad an idea it was at the time. In 1998, chips were expensive and underpowered. By 2010, a chip that cost less than a dollar could easily implement a DMCA-triggering access control, and manufacturers of all kinds were adding superfluous chips to everything from engine parts to smart lightbulbs whose sole purpose was to transform modification into felonies. This is what Jay Freeman calls "felony contempt of business-model."

So when the Harper government set out to import US-style anticircumvention law to Canada, Canadians were furious. A consultation on the proposal received 6,138 responses opposing the law, and 54 in support:

https://www.michaelgeist.ca/2010/04/copycon-final-numbers/

And yet, James Moore and Tony Clement pressed on. When asked how they could advance such an unpopular bill, opposed by experts and the general public alike, Moore told the International Chamber of Commerce that every objector who responded to his consultation was a "radical extremist" with a "babyish" approach to copyright:

https://www.cbc.ca/news/science/copyright-debate-turns-ugly-1.898216

As is so often the case, history vindicated the babyish radical extremists. The DMCA actually has an official way to keep score on this one. Every three years, the US Copyright Office invites public submissions for exemptions to DMCA 1201, creating a detailed, evidence-backed record of all the legitimate activities that anticircumvention law interferes with.

Unfortunately, "a record" is all we get out of this proceeding. Even though the Copyright Office is allowed to grant "exemptions," these don't mean what you think they mean. The statute is very clear on this: the US Copyright Office is required to grant exemptions for the act of circumvention, but is forbidden from granting exemptions for tools needed to carry out these acts.

This is headspinningly and deliberately obscure, but there's one anecdote from my long crusade against this stupid law that lays it bare. As I mentioned, the US Trade Rep has made the passage of DMCA-like laws in other countries a top priority since the Clinton years. In 2001, the EU adopted the EU Copyright Directive, whose Article 6 copy-pastes the provisions of DMCA 1201.

In 2003, I found myself in Oslo, debating the minister who'd just completed Norway's EUCD implementation. The minister was very proud of his law, boasting that he'd researched the flaws in other countries' anticircumvention laws and addressed them in Norway's law. For example, Norway's law explicitly allowed blind people to bypass access controls on ebooks in order to feed them into text-to-speech engines, Braille printers and other accessibility tools.

I knew where this was going. I asked the minister how this would work in practice. Could someone sell a blind person a tool to break the DRM on their ebooks? Of course not, that's totally illegal. Could a nonprofit blind rights group make such a tool and give it away to blind people? No, that's illegal too. What about hobbyists, could they make the tool for their blind friends? No, not that either.

OK, so how do blind people exercise their right to bypass access controls on ebooks they own so they can actually read them?

Here's how. Each blind person, all by themself, is expected to decompile and reverse-engineer Adobe Reader, locate a vulnerability in the code and write a new program that exploits that vulnerability to extract their ebooks. While blind people are individually empowered to undertake this otherwise prohibited activity, they must do so on their own: they can't share notes with one another on the process. They certainly can't give each other the circumvention program they write in this way:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/10/28/mcbroken/#my-milkshake-brings-all-the-lawyers-to-the-yard

That's what a use-only exemption is: the right to individually put a locked down device up on your own workbench, and, laboring in perfect secrecy, figure out how it works and then defeat the locks that stop you from changing those workings so they benefit you instead of the manufacturer. Without a "tools" exemption, a use exemption is basically a decorative ornament.

So the many use exemptions that the US Copyright Office has granted since 1998 really amount to nothing more than a list of defects in the DMCA that the Copyright Office has painstaking verified but is powerless to fix. We could probably save everyone a lot of time by scrapping the triennial exemptions process and replacing it with an permanent sign over the doors of the Library of Congress reading "Abandon hope, all ye who enter here."

All of this was well understood by 2010, when Moore and Clement were working on the Canadian version of the DMCA. All of this was explained in eye-watering detail to Moore and Clement, but was roundly ignored. I even had a go at it, publicly picking a fight with Moore on Twitter:

https://web.archive.org/web/20130407101911if_/http://eaves.ca/wp-content/uploads/2010/Conversations%20between%20@doctorow%20and%20@mpjamesmoore.jpg

Moore and Clement rammed their proposal through in the next session of Parliament, passing it as Bill C-11 in 2012:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_Modernization_Act

This was something of a grand finale for the pair. Today, Moore is a faceless corporate lawyer, while Clement was last seen grifting covid PPE (Clement's political career ended abruptly when he sent dick pics to a young woman who turned out to be a pair of sextortionists from Cote D'Ivoire, and was revealed as a serial sex-pest in the ensuing scandal:)

https://globalnews.ca/news/4646287/tony-clement-instagram-women/

Even though Moore and Clement are long gone from public life, their signature achievement remains a Canadian disgrace, an anchor chain tied around the Canadian economy's throat, and an impediment to Canadian progress.

This week, two excellent new Canadian laws received royal assent: Bill C-244 is a broad, national Right to Repair law; and Bill C-294 is a broad, national interoperability law. Both laws establish the right to circumvent access controls for the purpose of fixing and improving things, something Canadians deserve and need.

But neither law contains a tools exemption. Like the blind people of Norway, a Canadian farmer who wants to attach a made-in-Canada Honeybee tool to their John Deere tractor is required to personally, individually reverse-engineer the John Deere tractor and modify it to talk to the Honeybee accessory, laboring in total secrecy:

https://www.theregister.com/2024/11/12/canada_right_to_repair/

Likewise the Canadian repair tech who fixes a smart speaker or a busted smartphone – they are legally permitted to circumvent in order to torture the device's repair codes out of it or force it to recognize a replacement part, but each technician must personally figure out how to get the device firmware to do this, without discussing it with anyone else.

Thus do Moore and Clement stand athwart Canadian self-reliance and economic development, shouting "STOP!" though both men have been out of politics for years.

There has never been a better time to hit Clement and Moore's political legacy over the head with a shovel and bury it in a shallow grave. Canadian technologists could be making a fortune creating circumvention devices that repair and improve devices marketed by foreign companies.

They could make circumvention tools to allow owners of consoles to play games by Canadian studios that are directly sold to Canadian gamers, bypassing the stores operated by Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo and the 30% commissions they charge. Canadian technologists could be making diagnostic tools that allow every auto-mechanic in Canada to fix any car manufactured anywhere in the world.

Canadian cloud servers could power devices long after their US-based manufacturers discontinue support for them, providing income to Canadian cloud companies and continued enjoyment for Canadian owners of these otherwise bricked gadgets.

Canada's gigantic auto-parts sector could clone the security chips that foreign auto manufacturers use to block the use of third party parts, and every Canadian could enjoy a steep discount every time they fix their cars. Every farmer could avail themselves of third party parts for their tractors, which they could install themselves, bypassing the $200 service call from a John Deere technician who does nothing more than look over the farmer's own repair and then types an unlock code into the tractor's console.

Every Canadian who prints out a shopping list or their kid's homework could use third party ink that sells for pennies per liter, rather than HP's official colored water that cost more than vintage Veuve Cliquot.

A Canadian e-waste dump generates five low-paid jobs per ton of waste, and that waste itself will poison the land and water for centuries to come. A circumvention-enabled Canadian repair sector could generate 150 skilled, high-paid community jobs that saves gadgets and the Earth, all while saving Canadians millions.

Canadians could enjoy the resliency that comes of having a domestic tech and repair sector, and could count on it through pandemics and Trumpian trade-war.

All of that and more could be ours, except for the cowardice and greed of Tony Clement and James Moore and the Harper Tories who voted C-11 into law in 2012.

Everything the "radical extremists" warned them of has come true. It's long past time Canadians tore up anticircumvention law and put the interests of the Canadian public and Canadian tech businesses ahead of the rent-seeking enshittification of American Big Tech.

Until we do that, we can keep on passing all the repair and interop laws we want, but each one will be hamstrung by Moore and Clement's "felony contempt of business model" law, and the contempt it showed for the Canadian people.

Image: JeffJ (modified) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Tony_Clement_-_2007-06-30_in_Kearney,_Ontario.JPG

CC BY-SA 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

--

Jorge Franganillo (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Duga_radar_system-_wreckage_of_electronic_devices_(37885984654).jpg

CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/deed.en

[unboundprompts]

do you have any tips for writing mermaids? i love your work ^-^

How to Write Mermaids

-> Things to Think About and Consider When Writing Merpeople and Mer Fiction

-> How to Write a Mermaid (anc writing resources)

These are just some suggestions! Feel free to pick and choose based on what best fits your story.

Physical Appearance

Tail Variations: Instead of a uniform tail type, consider different adaptations: sleek, dolphin-like tails for fast swimmers; large, strong tails with iridescent scales for deep-sea mermaids; or frilled, flowing fins like a lionfish for camouflage. Some might have tails resembling eels or sharks, giving them a menacing or streamlined look.

Scales and Coloration: In deep-sea areas, mermaids might have dark, bioluminescent scales with patterns that mimic the stars or the sea floor. Shallow-water mermaids might have brighter, coral-like colors to blend in.

Scars and Symbols: Scars from battles with sea creatures, markings from coral, or even bioluminescent tattoos could add depth.

Eyes Adapted to the Ocean: Mermaids’ eyes might be unusually large, with reflective layers to enhance night vision. They could have vertical pupils like a cat’s or even multiple layers of eyelids, including a transparent one to protect them from salt and silt.

Webbed Hands and Clawed Fingers: Webbed hands would enhance their swimming ability, and clawed fingers might be used for self-defense or hunting. Some might have retractable claws or spines to protect themselves from predators.

Culture

Language and Communication: Consider how sound works underwater; it travels faster and farther but differently. Maybe they use gestures, a sign language, or even musical calls to communicate. Their language might be melodic or full of trills and hums that are difficult for land creatures to understand.

Beliefs and Myths: Mermaids would likely have their own stories, rituals, and superstitions. Maybe they worship ocean gods, the moon, or view shipwrecks as holy places. They might believe in omens from ocean currents, the arrival of rare sea creatures, or changes in the tides.

Social Structure: Decide if they live in schools, pods, or solitary. A royal family, councils of elders, or a group of shamans could govern them. Do they form alliances or rivalries with other sea creatures or even human sailors?

Hierarchy and Elders: Older mermaids or those with powerful magical abilities may hold significant respect and authority. These elders could be responsible for rituals, storytelling, and maintaining the balance of magic within their community.

Seasonal Gatherings and Ceremonies: The ocean has its own rhythms—tides, moon phases, migrations—and mermaids might gather for ceremonies tied to these events. For instance, they could honor the arrival of certain fish schools or perform rituals under a full moon for strength and unity.

Jewelry and Artifacts: Mermaids might decorate themselves with jewelry made of shells, coral, pearls, and items retrieved from shipwrecks. Certain pieces may symbolize rank, magical prowess, or family lineage, with specific stones or materials believed to channel energy.

Tattooing and Body Art: Many mermaids may tattoo themselves with ink made from squid or octopus, using markings that indicate status, clan, or achievements. Bioluminescent tattoos or body paint could glow at night or during important rituals.

Magical Abilities

Special Senses: Consider heightened senses, like echolocation, the ability to detect changes in water temperature, or a heightened sense of smell for tracking prey or sensing danger. These would add to their unique oceanic identity and give them a slight advantage over surface dwellers.

Control over Water and Weather: Some mermaids can call storms, manipulate tides, or create currents. This might be a rare gift, often feared for its destructive potential. Using such magic could leave them physically or mentally drained.

Healing and Transformation: Certain mermaids could have powers to heal wounds or diseases with seawater, or transform sea creatures into protective spirits. However, each healing might weaken them temporarily or require offerings to the ocean in return.

Song and Illusion: Siren song is a classic power; mermaids could enchant, hypnotize, or create illusions through melody. Overuse might leave them voiceless or mentally scarred, with some even risking losing themselves to the song forever.

Shape-Shifting: For those able to take human form, transformation might come at a great personal cost. Perhaps they can only transform for a limited time, or their time on land drains their magic, forcing them to return to the water to recover.

Physical Depletion: Magic use might be physically taxing, aging a mermaid slightly or sapping their strength. Frequent magic use could make them appear older or leave permanent marks on their body, like scars or discolored scales.

Price of Blood or Offering: Magic might demand a price—whether in the form of a personal sacrifice or a blood offering to the ocean. For powerful spells, mermaids may even need to leave behind something they value, such as memories, emotions, or treasured artifacts.

Risk of Transformation: High-level magic could alter a mermaid’s physical form temporarily or permanently. They might grow extra fins, become partially transparent, or even lose their voice after certain spells.

Mental Toll and "Ocean Madness": Overuse of magic could lead to a condition known as "Ocean Madness," a state in which mermaids lose touch with reality, becoming isolated or forgetting their own identity. This is particularly feared among mermaids, as it might mean permanent exile or being lost to the ocean.

Forbidden or Dark Magic: Some magic forms might be considered taboo or forbidden due to their dangerous nature. Practicing dark magic, like curses or soul-binding, could bring severe consequences, both in physical tolls and social exile.

Character Motivation and Conflict

Relationship with Humans: Decide whether mermaids are fascinated by or wary of humans. Some might be drawn to them out of curiosity or romantic allure, while others might distrust them due to pollution, fishing, or old tales of betrayal. Their interactions with humans can reveal a lot about their personality and worldview.

Desire for Land or Home: Consider what might tempt a mermaid to leave their watery home. Do they long to experience human life, seek revenge for an oceanic wrong, or retrieve a lost artifact from a shipwreck? This longing could add depth to their character.

Struggles with Transformation: If your mermaids can shift between human and mermaid forms, consider how this affects their identity and relationships. Transformation could be painful, rare, or come at a high price, adding dramatic tension and giving their character arc extra weight.

Quest for Authority: In a hierarchical society, some mermaids might crave power or authority, seeking to rise through the ranks or challenge an elder. Such ambition could lead them to take risks, learn forbidden magic, or ally with powerful sea creatures.

Personal Pride or Legacy: Some mermaids might want to establish themselves as legends, known for feats of bravery or wisdom. This could involve dangerous quests to recover lost artifacts, hunt rare sea creatures, or explore dangerous parts of the ocean. Their pursuit of legacy might set them at odds with their peers, especially if it leads to recklessness.

Torn Between Worlds: A mermaid who can transform and walk on land might struggle with a dual identity. If spending time on land slowly diminishes their powers, they could grapple with the desire to stay connected to both worlds, fearing losing either part of themselves.

Conflict Between Duty and Desire: Many mermaids might feel a sense of duty to their family, tribe, or ocean gods, conflicting with their personal desires. They could be pressured to fulfill a prophecy, protect a magical artifact, or avoid contact with humans, even if it clashes with their true passions.

Past Mistakes or Betrayals: A mermaid who has broken societal rules—whether by consorting with humans, using dark magic, or violating clan boundaries—might feel guilt or face exile. Redemption could become a strong motivator, pushing them to right their wrongs, often at great risk or personal cost.

Haunted by Family Legacy: If a mermaid comes from a family of notorious outcasts, warriors, or traitors, they might struggle with the burden of redeeming their family’s name or rising above that legacy. This could lead them into difficult choices about loyalty and personal integrity.

Hunters and Captors: Humans might hunt mermaids for their scales, powers, or knowledge, forcing mermaids into hiding or guerrilla-like resistance. A character driven by a desire for vengeance against humans could lead to morally complex actions and choices.

[meowguiiiin]

The game is done! I turned an artwork into a playable minigame!!

Finished the game yippee! Please let me know if you find any bugs and I'll try to fix them. :)

Thank you for 150+ notes on the original artwork!

[johnnyshrine]

★ 115 // “Murder is okay! :D”

[blissfullyunawares]

5 Days of Helping You Outline Your Next Novel

Day 1: Benefits of Outlining Before Writing Your Book

Follow along for all 5 installments of the mini series: helping you outline your next novel

I. Clear Direction - knowing where you’re going allows you to pack the right kind of clothes, same with a novel - know where you’re going so you can bring the right stuff

II. Strong Structure - by writing an outline, you can structure your book to have a natural rise and a fall, like breathing

III. Consistency in Writing - not getting stuck with what happens next allows you to write more content more consistently

IV. Intentional Themes - by defining your story outline, you can sprinkle in some intentional symbols and themes within your writing

V. Better Character Development - knowing the overall arc of your story allows your characters to experience the moment and become who they’re meant to be. you can add in vulnerable moments, mistakes, and bad decisions to help them become the best (or worst) version of themselves

VII. Opportunities for Foreshadowing - by knowing where you’re going, you can add in witty little details of foreshadowing (ex: the mercenary had a reputation that - well, you’ll see) to string your readers along

VIII. Scene Variety - similar to pacing, scene variety can be inserted into your novel to prevent boring repetitions and keep the pov fresh and interesting

IX. Realistic Plot Lines - knowing the journey and destination before the characters do allows you to insert realistic motive and plot lines that drive your characters, instead of allowing your characters to drive the plot with unforeseen chaos (although this happens sometimes too and it’s okay!)

your reblogs help me help more ppl 💕

You can find Day 2 of this mini series [here].

follow along for writing prompts, vocabulary lists, and helpful content like this! <333

✨ #blissfullyunawaresoriginals ✨

[dammjamboy]

BETTER CALL SAUL!

[buginacup]

Unity's behavior is embarrassingly greedy. Clearly trying to brute force their way into skimming revenue from every mobile game on the market -> pushing their adware onto every piece of software. It's been really disheartening to see every game development software company demand exponentially more profit the past few years. Especially since it comes at the expense of scaring away blossoming developers...

If you haven't learned to make games, but plan to - use something open source like GODOT, or at least an old version of RPG maker with a one-time purchase of a license.

If the owner of the IDE you're using would be legally within their rights to do what Unity is doing now you should assume that they will do it eventually too.

[cursoulla]

the urge to spill all my headcanons for Noir/Nier(Original) aka Shadowlord,, but holding myself back… actually what inspired this was- oh god. just a lot of body horror and… worship, reassurance… *vibrating at inhuman frequencies*

let’s just say. i’m in my feelings about them very OFTEN. i shan’t gush further and will let the emotion I tried to convey in this piece do it for me,

[physalian]

3 More Character Types the World Needs More Of

Or at least, I do.

1. The denied redeemed villain

I need this. So badly right now. So, so, so many “redemption arcs” are half-assed and carry undertones of guilt by the heroes, gaslighting them into thinking the villain “wasn’t all that bad” right before they make some big heroic sacrifice, as if that’s ever enough to make up for the damage that was done.

But you know what I never see? A villain who’s done some awful shit, wakes up to reality, tries to apologize and… is denied. No, it’s not enough to be sorry. No, you’re not absolved of your crimes just because you cry really hard on your knees. Yes, you have to work for it. Yes, even if you work for it for the rest of your whole life, those you hurt are not obligated to forgive you.

Example that sadly did not happen in canon: Enji Todoroki

2. The liar revealed who loses

This fucker lies and cheats his way into his lover’s arms (and liars revealed are always men, because their love interests are always women put in the place of “but he tried really hard and you need to forgive him uwu” unless it’s gay). Similar to above, no, you do not get rewarded just for feeling sorry.

This character builds an entire relationship (and it’s specifically romance that I take such an issue with) on a lie. They are not who they say they are, specifically, they lie about their identity because they know their lover would not let this happen if they knew the truth.

It’s one thing to lie about something inconsequential, or to lie about something unrelated, but to lie deliberately to present yourself as the perfect suitor—and these are never little white lies, these are usually entirely false identities, or secrets so damning that risking the truth could mean arrest or even death—just. Why?

Yeah, okay, you never thought you’d get this far. Cool. You don’t have to tell her the truth, but you have to leave before you trick her into sleeping with you.

It’s just. So squicky. And the lesson always is that he deserves love, that he makes up for it with everything else, that he’s just got a winning personality. She always forgives him, even if they fight about it, it’s so, so predictable.

Examples that did not lose: Aladdin, Evan Hansen

3. The paragon who loses faith

I don’t know that we need a whole bunch of these characters, but so many paragons are painted as heroes with unshakable loyalty to their causes and I’d love to see a devolution of character where they just can’t keep smiling and pretending it’s alright. That there is a limit to how much shit they can take.

They don’t have to go full villain, but maybe they just stop caring, maybe they get cynical, maybe they just don’t show up for work the next day, maybe they’re not there when they’re needed the most.

There’s a few stories I can think of where the masses realize they’ve screwed up and show the hero that their faith has been rewarded (Nolan Bats being one of them) but I mean really a hero who just cannot take it anymore, throws in the towel, and walks away knowing it’s the hardest thing they’ve ever had to do.

Example: (kind of) Captain America

—

Sorry this list is kind of a bummer. It’s a bummer kind of week.

[numbpilled-themes]

CHARACTER SHEET - parchment/medieval style profile page for neocities/nekoweb

LIVE PREVIEW

FREE DOWNLOAD

FOLLOW NUMBPILLED ON KO-FI

[definitelynotshouting]

saw this post assigning devastating quotes to each life series members, got incredibly inspired, and decided to try my own hand at it but specifically with snippets of the poetry ive personally written throughout the years :] thoughts and musings on several of my choices will be under the cut if you're interested in that sorta thing!! Enjoy<3

Bdubs: "it's all so blue. so blue, so wet, so cold, but you've got a fire in your heart like a hundred rockets. you aren't hungry, but you could eat the dead, / cut your teeth on a rotting corpse."

BigB: "SOMETHING HAS FRACTURED HERE AND IT WILL NEVER BE THE SAME AGAIN. EACH DAY YOU WILL CHASE THE FAULT LINES LOOKING FOR A BRIDGE ONLY TO FIND IT ALREADY BURNT."

Etho: "I am above myself, hovering, pressing pale fingers into the dull bruise of yesterday to test its lingering ache. Is this all that's left?"

Gem: "what are gods if not the mothers of our own inventions. we are the avatars of violence and love and hope and fear in equal measure."

Scar: "I think I want to live. I know one day, I must die. In the cosmic wheel of fortune, I am a gamble in the making, gentle breath washing a little luck over the dice."

Grian: "Within the shape of my clawed fingers are knives: scrabbled dirt; scarlet lines; the escape route / Between a fence and / Tall grasses."

Impulse: "Life's bitter, stilted offering / Is that every person we meet / Will one day become a perfect stranger."

Martyn: "Dangerous beasts must earn / Their survival. / You are no different than a knife / In the hands of murderers."

Lizzie: "When I think of the egg-tooth, / I revel in purple glass; the lightning; the shatter; the knife-slip between / Death, and a wake."

Mumbo: "This is your life now, / Found in the cracks and crevices, scraps pried between laughter and reckless abandon."

Pearl: "I am begging, raw in the face of absolution— do not hate me. Please, keep watering me in your garden, / Despite how closely my heart resembles a weed."

Ren: "— and sometimes hearts are forged in violence /— and sometimes blood cannot form scabs / — and sometimes wounds carry half-hearted sutures / — and we are all but living fragments / —"

Skizz: "Just a little longer. Please. / There is light pooling at the bottom of the flower vase."

Scott: "I can only hope that with the rising of the dawn / I will pass through darkness and return to day, / Where I am a solar ray blinding— teeth and claws sharpened, the stretch of my skin carrying gold / Above the dull, dug out earth"

Joel: "Tamed by nothing, no one, I lose myself to the shattered chains; / Yes, there is a loss."

Jimmy: "for year after bloody year, i clung to life with aching fingernails, grasped at every straw, took every scrap of double-barrelled hope and shot myself in the chest with it."

Tango: "every time you claw yourself from the ashes you insist it will never happen again. every time you reach the breaking point, it happens a little bit faster."

Cleo: "It's about catharsis, not letting go. / Because a part of me wants to hold this, / A swelling hurt deeper than tides, / Hotter than stars. The kind of rage / A mother might raise against her own child."

I dont share my poetry on here very often, partially because it tends to end up coming from a very personal part of me, but since this was actually a lot of fun maybe i'll start posting my poems more often here :]] i think what i found most interesting about this exercise was that as i scrolled my notes app and cherry-picked quotes for each character, it felt like the ones i chose naturally became part of a larger conversation-- as if the characters were speaking to me through my own words about their lowest points, about their ultimate views on the games filtered through the lens of a red life.

It felt enlightening; i dont often feel like im speaking to characters or being informed about their plots/preferences, etc. the way many other writers discuss in workshops or casually online, but by the end of this exercise i felt like i just... understood them, better than i had before. There's something inexplicable about reading your own words and consciously finding ways to apply them in a way that encapsulates them down to a character's core that just... truly highlights the specific qualities that resonate most with you. And i think stumbling upon that organically was a very vivid and incredible experience for me

Admittedly, i did struggle on Scott, Ren, and Etho a lot-- im not as familiar with them as characters, and for a while i couldn't quite pinpoint what exact themes they tend to carry with them throughout all their life seasons. But when i started to really look at everyone's quotes as a whole, i realized they felt like a story, like the response to a question-- as if i was being TOLD what they felt and how, and that that was how i needed to frame the rest of my selections. So Scott's ended up being about control, and the desperate hanging onto of it; Ren's is about the acceptance and bitterness of what he cannot change; Etho's is a quiet resignation rounded out with softer disbelief. The more i looked at these choices, the more they felt correct to me-- and while i still think i have a ways to go before i fully understand these characters, i feel like this has helped me a lot with that ultimate goal :]

Of all these poetry snippets, though, i think Scar, Skizz, and Joel's are my absolute favorites. Skizz's poem is actually the whole poem in its entirety (as is Cleo's, funnily enough)-- it's a short, very simple poem that is incredibly close to my heart for many reasons, but the main one being because it was written at one of my lowest points a few years back. Its about clawing for hope when there isnt any, and finding even the smallest of beautiful things to hold onto, and begging yourself to keep holding onto that at any cost. The pure, clean beauty of watching light refract through a vase of flowers, and knowing that sometimes, that's all there is to live for-- I felt like that really spoke to Skizz's life series character as a whole: finding the beauty in every tiny thing, no matter how small, and scrabbling for more time to appreciate it.

Scar's snippet comes from a much longer poem of mine about the difficulty of reconciling the idea of a future when you havent had to think of one before (incidentally, Etho's snippet comes from this poem as well). I think out of everyone, this quote encapsulates him the best; i like how it subtly references that inner well of vivacity he draws from that many other characters struggle to find, and how that in turn ties in with the lore that he never died a final death during Secret Life. And i love how it simultaneously manages to encompass the way he utilizes the social game in each season as well-- Scar's an incredibly intelligent social player, and i think the imagery of a gambler breathing their luck over the dice as they cast it, and as he casts himself at others for alliances and enemies, truly does fit him.

As for Joel, the full poem his quote comes from is one im particularly proud of, especially for its final lines. I think, quite honestly, i can let this poem stand for itself in its entirety:

They say transformation is letting the light in, But in my mind it's a violence. A coarseness, a fracturing, the bloody vowels between a scream And a howl. How do you transform without killing yourself? When I am a lion, my hands and feet Grow claws; my teeth sharpen. No longer do I spark— I ignite. Tamed by nothing, no one, I lose myself to the shattered chains; Yes, there is a loss. To transform is to leave behind a body And eat its still-breathing corpse.

I find myself referencing this poem a lot even in my daily life-- as longterm readers of mine already know, one of my favorite themes is that of replacing yourself and permanent transformation. This poem really is just about how changing, in any shape or form, alters you forever; how you can look back on yourself from even just a few months ago and feel like a completely different person despite remaining the same. Connecting it with Joel's character, and how he acts during his red lives in each season, was a natural and intuitive progression once i really sat and thought about it.

Alright thats enough yapping from me 😂😂😂 im not used to writing meta nor delving into my poetry on here, so this was a bit of an experimental post for me. If youve read up until this point, i both applaud your patience and really hope you enjoyed this window into my personal works and thoughts on them :]] cheers, and thanks to @/chipperchemical the op of the original post for inspiring me!!!❤️❤️❤️

[meowguiiiin]

WIP game

Turning it into a game on Scratch now!

I haven’t drawn any full pieces recently because of this lol

[fumifooms]

What if we were both magic prodigies and it otherized us in different ways and we devoted ourselves to protecting a family member who has general other goals & priorities. What if we both did self-sacrifical devotion in opposite ways.

What if we were dark mirrors of each other and where I've grown overcontrolling you've grown complacent. What if, bought as a servant into a pretty loving home, ownership and control is what love looks like to me, and to you neglected and lonely growing up, love is gratefully taking any scraps of it you’re lent.

By belonging to someone, even if she comes back injured or fails at finding Delgal, she feels like she belongs and is cherished, by owning someone he feels safe in them not leaving him.

She’s what’s tethering him do you see… And he’s the only thing giving her direction and purpose in her state. She needs a compass and he needs a support.

They’re both so out of it 😭 It’s the weirdly intense and unearned mutual trust and reliance on each other?? They’re each other’s weird little comfort codependent teddy bear. Or at least they were headed towards that before SHE DIED THEN HE DIED THEN THEY BOTH FORGOT ABOUT EACH OTHER AND NEVER MET EVER AGAIN. Though she’s also the guard attack hound keeping him safe… And vice versa he heals her and can rewrite her very being with just one wave of his hand. They’re both so so mentally and physically vulnerable both but they cling onto each other. They can’t perceive things accurately but despite it all someway somehow they stumble into something closer to resembling companionship just before they both die. Falin is just that kind and Thistle is just that lonely. Overworked.

We both haven’t lived for ourselves in a very long time, haven’t we.

They both have a similar devotion to the people they love but again the difference is that Thistle starts overtsepping while Falin is self-effacing. The other difference between them is that people care about Falin <3 People have given up on Thistle long ago, and he has given people reasons to, while people refuse to give up on Falin. Yaad has a mini arc about it dw about it it’s ok he’s not all alone in the end 😭😭 He reached out for Marcille’s hand but they already all wanted to help him, they just had to be given the chance to, Yaad just had to be given the chance to, it’s okay I’m okay

Hey what if we learned to get in touch with our own identity and the world around us and living in the present again through being in the worst codependent situationship ever.

Falin and Thistle sitting in a tree, sucking on flowers together because they’re h-u-n-g-r-y 💕💕💕

I bet he’s only ever thought of flowers as useless ornaments. Weak weeds. But she shows him they’re tasty and useful and good and pretty in their own right too and deserve existing without proving their worth and waaa <33 Thistles…... Did you know thistles taste sweet if you remove the thorns and eat them?

"Even as a chimera, her kind nature remains" you can’t suppress her in the way that matters. You can’t soothe him in the way that matters. It’s doomed. You’re doomed. It’s all doomed. Save me.