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The third panel looks like it's from the phonk walk meme and I love it. Also love how much Jack Nicholson energy the dude in the comic has.

*doom music starts to play* I actually kindof like scheduling these kinds of appointments now...

but seriously Fellas, don't forget to schedule a pap smear every couple of years just in case. If you still have a cervix you can still get cervical cancer. ilu

this has been a psa

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this has probably been done to death but i wanted to do it anyway - here's a trans flag colour-picked from a sunset in Fallout: New Vegas! + the screenshot i took to make it <3

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Breaking fictional canon isn't inherently bad actually

Gonna write something out that's been on my mind ever since I watched a let's play of Fallout New California. For those that don't know about it, it's a prequel mod for New Vegas. It's mostly pretty good, starts off great, some of the companion characters are uhhh... let's just say they have a faint stink of "my precious OC" if that makes sense. The story itself is for the most part interesting tho near the end it goes into some Mary Sue crossfic bullshit that might turn some people off and turned me off at first. But after watching that playthrough, there was one small part that made me reconsider my opinion of the ending, as well as what canon means for a piece of fiction.

=SPOILERS FOR FALLOUT: NEW CALIFORNIA AND FALLOUT IN GENERAL=

So the story's big reveal at the end is that the area you play in is what will become the Divide in New Vegas and you are the Courier. And the story is about a top secret government experiment using some pre-war symbiotic organism discovered in the Marianas Trench (i think?) that makes you basically immortal. You're immune to disease, radiation, don't age, can only be killed by taking a nuke to the face, that sort of shit. And you're the child of a super mutant who somehow figured out a way to not be sterile anymore. Oh, and you're also genetically a clone of the Vault Dweller from Fallout 1.

Now I know what you might be thinking: this sounds so fucking dumb, it breaks canon in half, all in an effort to canonically explain why the game's protagonist can do the ridiculous shit they do, like surviving a headshot at point blank, not needing food, water or sleep, getting stronger ridiculously fast (i.e. leveling up) and tanking damage that would drop a normal person if not outright vaporise them. And overall it turns both your character, the Courier and the Vault Dweller from opportune shmucks whose accomplishments were a mix of skill, perseverance and luck, into deity-like figures whose accomplishments were genetically predestined or whatever.

And yes, all this is true.

BUT!

Hear me out: in the mod when you are faced with that revelation as the character, there's a Wild Wasteland dialogue option which turns into a reference of the Vader/Luke confrontation from Empire Strikes Back where the antagonist that tells you all this breaks the 4th wall and goes "Damn your canon" and it's kinda cringy but also it made me laugh. It's honestly kind of funny. And it was the devs basically laying out their mission statement "Fuck canon, rule of cool, canon isn't a divine gospel to be followed". And I like that. I'm a long-time Fallout fan and the series as a whole has some great writing and worldbuilding but it has a lot of dumb shit in it as well. Dumb shit that was put in because the devs thought it'd be funny. No, it doesn't make sense that you find the TARDIS randomly in the desert or come across a weirdo in a robe guarding a bridge and asking you to solve 3 riddles to proceed or a group of BoS knights who are LARPing as medieval knights from Camelot (both being Monty Python and the Holy Grail references) or the cast of the original SW trilogy chilling around a campfire or a fourth wall breaking cafe where characters from Fallout 1 are hanging out and talking like actors discussing their roles off set. But it's the exact kind of dumb shit as the revelation in New California.

There's more tho. If it was just funny, sure, it made me laugh but it would still be bad writing. A decent joke at the expense of the writing wouldn't negate that. I'm someone who hates Fallout 3's story and worldbuilding for shoehorning in super mutants, the Enclave and the Brotherhood of Steel just because they're "iconic" to the Fallout setting and barely giving them the justification to be there. Super mutants?

"Oh, there was a vault experimenting with FEV."

On the other side of the country. Meaning that the entire plot and worldbuilding of Fallout 1 went from something unique with long-lasting consequences for the entire Wasteland to a cheap threat you can find anywhere from Alaska to Florida.

Why are all the mutants stupid brutish savage cannibals that scream at you and keep human remains in literal gore bags?

"Uhhh... there's one super mutant who's smart, friendly and will join you as a companion."

Why's the Enclave here? They were destroyed in Fallout 2. They were literally nuked out of existence. What few of them remained off the oil rig would not have had the resources or manpower to A) mount an expedition across the continent and B) present as big of a fighting force and threat as they do.

"*cricket noises*"

Why are the BoS here? They were isolationist pseudoreligious weirdos who were almost wiped out by the Enclave. How the fuck did they get here and why are they the default good guys now?

"*vaguely gestures at internal schism*"

Okay to be fair, there is a tiny bit more justification for how and why the BoS are there and the way they are.

Why are there fucking deathclaws in Washington DC?

"*radio silence*"

You get the picture, you know the song and dance. Hbomberguy made all these criticisms and more years ago.

So why do I shit on these retcons for feeling cheap and cynical on top of ruining established canon but the bullshit in New California doesn't feel as bad?

Well, I have a lot of love for Fallout but I've also embraced the reality that Bethesda doesn't give a shit about the lore or art of the series, or the labor of its original creators, and will shoehorn in whatever they need in order to churn out a marketable inoffensive product. I have no faith that they can make anything as even remotely good as New Vegas or as stupidly sincere and sincerely stupid as The Frontier or, to a much lesser extent, New California. I don't need Fallout to be gravely serious or follow strict canon and relative realism (although that would be nice), what I want most is to experience something that makes me feel, something that was made by people who wanted to make it, who had genuine love and passion for what they were making, and the source material they were drawing from. Does it matter if it's fanfiction? Not really. Fallout London is technically fanfiction and it's one of the best Fallout games I've played. It's also the queerest Fallout game I've ever played and as a filthy queer, that matters a lot to me. (You can join a faction of punk anarchists who are actual political anarchists and not just the pop-culture bastardisation of what anarchism is. Play it, it's great). All this to say that merely breaking the canon of a piece of fiction doesn't have to be inherently bad. It matters who does the retcon, how and why. Even moreso if the creators have the balls to say "we know it breaks canon, we don't care, we just want to do it".

(Also should go without saying that retcons made out of bigotry are pathetic and "creators" who do that should be sealed in a vault with a panther)

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Fascism is when uh fucking. You kill more Nazis than anyone else and you're an ideologically committed anti-faacist. But uh the communists were too authoritarian about it. Wild misinterpretation of a non-aggression pact. I'm the smartest fucker alive I deserve a fucking medal. Communism = fascism just like the CIA said

Homeslice, if you wanna argue at least have the balls not to send me anonymous messages. I know you don't, cos you tankies are fucking cowards, but at least try to look like you have some.

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Tankie spotted. When did you fart-sniffing losers infest Tumblr?

"The point is that Marxism and Anarchism are built up on entirely different principles, in spite of the fact that both come into the arena of the struggle under the flag of Socialism. The cornerstone of Anarchism is the individual, whose emancipation, according to its tenets, is the principal condition for the emancipation of the masses, the collective body. According to the tenets of Anarchism, the emancipation of the masses is impossible until the individual is emancipated. Accordingly, its slogan is: 'Everything for the individual.' The cornerstone of Marxism, however, is the masses, whose emancipation, according to its tenets, is the principal condition for the emancipation of the individual. That is to say, according to the tenets of Marxism, the emancipation of the individual is impossible until the masses are emancipated. Accordingly, its slogan is: 'Everything for the masses."

- J. V. Stalin, Anarchism or Socialism?

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No, I just reject your definition. Also again, not doing yourself any favors by quoting a fascist.

"The point is that Marxism and Anarchism are built up on entirely different principles, in spite of the fact that both come into the arena of the struggle under the flag of Socialism. The cornerstone of Anarchism is the individual, whose emancipation, according to its tenets, is the principal condition for the emancipation of the masses, the collective body. According to the tenets of Anarchism, the emancipation of the masses is impossible until the individual is emancipated. Accordingly, its slogan is: 'Everything for the individual.' The cornerstone of Marxism, however, is the masses, whose emancipation, according to its tenets, is the principal condition for the emancipation of the individual. That is to say, according to the tenets of Marxism, the emancipation of the individual is impossible until the masses are emancipated. Accordingly, its slogan is: 'Everything for the masses."

- J. V. Stalin, Anarchism or Socialism?

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Quoting Stalin on the supposed pitfalls of anarchism isn't the dunk you think it is, homeslice. To presuppose that individualism and collectivism are diametrically opposed is bourgeois propaganda.

"The point is that Marxism and Anarchism are built up on entirely different principles, in spite of the fact that both come into the arena of the struggle under the flag of Socialism. The cornerstone of Anarchism is the individual, whose emancipation, according to its tenets, is the principal condition for the emancipation of the masses, the collective body. According to the tenets of Anarchism, the emancipation of the masses is impossible until the individual is emancipated. Accordingly, its slogan is: 'Everything for the individual.' The cornerstone of Marxism, however, is the masses, whose emancipation, according to its tenets, is the principal condition for the emancipation of the individual. That is to say, according to the tenets of Marxism, the emancipation of the individual is impossible until the masses are emancipated. Accordingly, its slogan is: 'Everything for the masses."

- J. V. Stalin, Anarchism or Socialism?

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Fucking hell. If you wanna draw a cute girl giving you head and then swallowing just do hentai. Why go through the trouble of making this?

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Luz brings The Conquest of Bread next time she goes to the Boiling Isles

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The fact that this is 80 fucking years ago but still just as relevant is terrifying.

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December 12, 2024 - Someone in Seattle reprogrammed a roadside construction sign to read ONE LESS CEO - MANY MORE TO GO. [video]

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Happy New Year 🎊 🎉

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With me it started late but as a kid I would identify more with non human characters. Later I started identifying more with female characters and when I started playing games, with RPGs especially, at first I played with male characters but I never identified with them and it was like inhabiting the body of a machine. Later I tried playing female characters and identified much more with them. Still wasn't one to one but was much closer to them.

Obligatory ping at @degenerate-mystery-inc-whore for her appearance in this comic. The DS2 story is one of her favorites.

Honorable mention to Skyrim as well. I installed a Mod in my PC version that let me access a cave with custom items. One of them was a ring that changed your main character's sex. I would make a new file, head immediately to the cave, and then get the ring and wear it for the remainder of the game.

This led to a fascinating experience wherein I found a letter that an NPC was carrying that referred to me with female pronouns. I re-read that note a few dozen times. It made me feel something.

Anyways. I cracked 5 years later.

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Source

This entire article is worth the read. Fuck Gilead

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The coordination that would've taken. This made my day

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I don't know if it's people not having the patience anymore so much as studio corpos wanting to spend as little money as they can. Just to take Arcane as a recent example, that show was allegedly supposed to have 5 seasons and then the corpos forced the studio to compress 4 seasons' worth of story into 9 episodes cos the production was allegedly too expensive. And I'm saying not that the show didn't cost a lot to make but corpos don't care about the quality of a piece of art, only how much money they can squeeze from selling it.

Man is it just me or are a lot of TV shows nowadays are written to have big emotional episodes in scenes with very little build up.