#<<<you can get me into anything if you have a good enough soundtrack. the power of a banger character theme

[bbq-potato-chip]

oooh orchestral shinji theme save me aughhhhhh

#nge soundtrack save me nge soundtrack...save me nge soundtrack #<<<you can get me into anything if you have a good enough soundtrack. the power of a banger character theme #is stronger than anyone can ever know #its seven minutes long and so dramatic its so good i could listen to it all day (as if that wasnt what i did all day yesterday) #sorry i know no one asked but oooho music. thanks thats all

[jazzthatonewriterchick]

Lovers & Friends (18+ Fic)

Pairing: Keigo Takami x Black!Fem!Reader (Friends to Lovers)

Synopsis: In which you and Keigo have begun to realize the strange new feelings you both have for each other after one drunken night at a close friend’s wedding that ends with you in his bed, but because of your longtime friendship and committed relationships with other people, you’re more than happy to forget that night even happened and keep your mutual feelings in the dark…for now, at least. 

Story Warnings: Smutty smut; 18+ (MINORS GET AWAY); Cheating/Infidelity; Mating; Light Degradation; Spanking; Exhibitionism; Multiple Positions; Creampie; Unprotected PIV Sex; Facial; Scent Play; Marking; Spitting; Deepthroating; Cunnilingus; Begging; Edgeplay; Power Play; Wing-Stroking; Daddy Kink; Some Angst; Hurt/Comfort; Mild Violence

Disclaimer: I own none of the characters mentioned in this fic. However, as this is my writing, I do not give permission for my work to be reposted on any other sites that are not from my own accounts. Thank you!

Writer's Note: Got another smutty ass story for y'all! And it's with my baby daddy Hawks!! I had this idea in storage for a while. Idk how long it'll be, but I'll try to finish it before the holidays start coming since shit is gonna get BUSY. Thank you always for the love & views! -Jazz

Chapters: Soundtrack. One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven. Eight. Nine. Ten. Eleven. Twelve. Thirteen. Fourteen. Fifteen. Sixteen. Seventeen. Eighteen. Nineteen. Twenty. Bonus Chapter.

Read on AO3 here!

***********

Chapter One: The Dry Spell. 

“God, yes, Y/N!” Rei shouts from above you, his hips grinding against yours as he pistons in and out of you. 

The bedsprings to your bed creak in time with his movements which are relentless as he approaches his orgasm. “You feel so good!” he moans, eyes closed and a smile on his face. “Are you feelin’ it too?” 

You stare at him from underneath his body, barely making a peep. “Yeah,” you mumble. “I’m definitely feelin’ something.” Instead of looking at how much ecstasy your boyfriend is in above you from the completely dry and unsatisfying sex, you look off to the window where the warm summer night air blows in. 

You wonder briefly what other people are doing on a nice night such as this one. Hopefully something better than this: lying underneath a man and pretending to like how his fingers are rubbing your clit too hard.

Not that he notices. He doesn’t notice much when he’s close to nutting. You instantly feel horrible for thinking this way about your man, but shit, after a year of dating, you’d think the guy would know how to please his woman. You guess not since the sex hasn’t gotten any better since you two did had it the first time. 

All you can do is grasp his shoulders and let him do his thing. When he proceeds to rut into you like he’s trying to hit a home run, you know he’s close. He usually only uses about 10% of his quirk at this point into sex. At first, you were uncomfortable with the amount of speed he was using so he cut back, but now you’re used to it. 

“Fuck!” he shouts, his dark coils of hair bouncing around his head as his hips snap into yours again and again. He grips your hips roughly, meaning you’ll definitely have bruises on your hips tomorrow. He goes so fast that you hit your head against the headboard repeatedly, but you don’t say anything. You don’t want to ruin his fun. It’s bad enough you’re not enjoying yourself even the least bit. You don’t even have the urge to reach down and rub your clit to cum with him. 

But you do care about the guy and you don’t want to hurt his feelings, so this is usually the point where you fake your orgasm. Getting into character, you grip his shoulders and wrap your legs around him, pulling him in deeper. “Yeah, baby,” you gasp into his ear. “Cum with me, please! Make me cum! Yes, yes, just like that!” 

A string of fake moans and whines you remember hearing in your favorite porn videos leaves your lips as Rei fucks you until the point of no return. The moans that leave his lips are shrill and loud. You sigh, knowing you’ll have issues with your neighbors again over noise complaints. When he finally cums, it is just as uneventful and anti-climatic as a bad action movie. His muscles clench and his body seizes, his mouth open in a silent O of pure ecstasy. When Rei cums, he always sounds like he’s having the biggest yawn of his life. 

You just continue to play your part, acting like you’re cumming with him. However, your mind is somewhere else entirely. Though his handsome face and sweat-soaked body are nice to look at, you feel nothing even remotely close to arousal that urges you to cum. You feel nothing. And you hate that. 

Finally, after giving you some more sloppy thrusts of his hips, Rei looks down at you and smiles, bliss on his face. “That was amazing,” he sighs. “You’re amazing.” You manage to smile as he lovingly strokes your face. “You’re so pretty when you cum,” he coos before leaning down to kiss your lips. 

Now, Rei is a great kisser–he has these full, pink lips that he knows how to work against yours. You wish you could cum just by his makeout sessions. But this is about the only thing he’s really good at when it comes to physical intimacy, especially in the bedroom. It isn’t that he doesn’t care about your pleasure too, but he isn’t attentive. He doesn’t quite know or understand your body. 

Or maybe you just don’t know yours. That may be another reason why you’re not feeling sexy time with your boyfriend. 

You look away towards the window as your boyfriend rolls off of you, satisfied with the unfulfilling sex you two just had. You don’t tell him you didn’t cum. You just let him feel proud of himself, not wanting to argue or hurt him. But the simmering frustration inside of you doesn’t let up. 

Rei reaches for you for a snuggle like you usually do after sex, but you’re not in the mood to pretend tonight. “Um!” you squeak, suddenly sitting up straight. Rei stares at you, confused. “I-I’m gonna go pee,” you tell him, giving him a reassuring smile. “I’ll be right back.” 

Rei, in all of his beauty, with his tan skin, toned body, and that cute little mole on his chin, smiles at you. “Hurry back,” he coos, sitting up against the headboard of your bed. You smile and slip out of bed, quickly grabbing your robe from the floor that Rei ripped off of you beforehand. 

You slip into your private bedroom and close the door, locking it for good measure. Then you sit on the edge of your bathtub and put your head in your hands. Your body yearns for release and your pussy aches in desperation. You’d run the sink water and masturbate if you didn’t know you’d feel guilty for it later.

You groan, running your hands through your hair. “Why are you like this?” you ask yourself. 

You wish you had the answer. The unfulfilling sex is nothing new–it’s been happening for months now. You don’t know when you realized how much you despised having sex with Rei, but it never let up or resolved itself. 

For one, the sex is boring. While Rei loves his missionary and doggy style but he doesn’t mind switching things up when you ask. You want to 69? He does it. You want to be on top? He lets you with no problem. 

But kink has never been Rei’s thing in the bedroom. There was one time you and Rei tried handcuffs one night, but he had lost the key, so you never ventured down the road to kinkiness ever again. But with every new, adventurous thing you tried in the bedroom, nothing worked. While it’s totally fine for kinky sex to not be someone’s thing, there are times when you want more from Rei. You want some excitement! Some razzle dazzle! Something to have you coming back for more!

Secondly, Rei isn’t as attentive or in tune with your body as you want him to be. Though you’ve tried to teach him, he’s always pinching your nipples just a little too hard or wiggling his tongue a little too fast when he goes down. You often just let him do what he wants now without speaking up because of how hard he’s been going with work. 

And then there’s a third reason: you simply don’t feel that connection with Rei during sex, which is odd because he’s such an attractive and amazing guy! He’s a gentleman; kind and intelligent; sweet and funny. Not to mention he’s an amazing pro hero, ranked at no. 9. He goes by the name “Tempo” to match his speed quirk. He can control and utilize his quirk extremely well during missions. You’ve seen him in action many, many times since you’ve worked together over the years. 

You found yourself working alongside him at your first agency (which you’re still at now) shortly after graduating UA when you were just eighteen. Word around the office was that he was crushing on you, but you never had a chance to investigate because he was transferred to a new agency that paid him a lot more four years later.

Time passed and at the age of twenty-six, you found yourself crossing his path again a year ago during a mission that involved a bank robbery and a villain with a gas quirk. You knew Rei the moment you saw him once you got a look at his hero’s fit and those coils of black hair that reached his shoulders. After an arrest and a job well done, Rei had asked you out for coffee and that was all she wrote. 

Now here you are, about to rip your hair out over a possible future of doomed sex and no orgasms. This is truly a tragic tale for you both. After a few more minutes of moping and regretting your life choices, you splash some cold water on your face from the sink and walk back into your bedroom to find Rei getting dressed. “What’s up?” you ask as he pulls on his briefs and then his jeans. 

“Villain attack,” he sighs, his tall, broad frame silhouetted in the moonlight as he buttons his pants. “Fucker decided to terrorize downtown by setting fire to some buildings. Apparently, he has a Pyro quirk. It’s not nothin’ too bad, but my boss wants me posted with a couple of other heroes I’ve worked with before.” He turns to you, looking apologetic. “I’m sorry, honey. I wanted to stay tonight, especially since Rumi isn’t here, so we could spend more time together.” 

You feel a twinge of guilt in your gut. Here you are, neglecting him and acting distant, and he’s so concerned about spending more time with you because of your work. You feel like the worst girlfriend and person in the world.

You go to him, wrapping your arms around his neck. “It’s fine. The work of a pro is never done, ya know.” You peck him on the lips, nuzzling your nose with his. “Go, and be careful. I don’t need to see you on the news tomorrow all bruised up.” 

Rei scoffs, rolling his pine-tree green eyes at you. “Please. Like that’d be possible with my speed.” You stand back and watch him put his shirt and shoes on before he presses another kiss to your lips, holding onto your waist. “I love you,” he whispers against your lips. 

“I love you too,” you reply, which is definitely something you say to someone who loves you. At least that’s what you tell yourself. But even as the words leave your lips, you don’t feel like you truly mean them–yet another reason you’re a horrible girlfriend and person. You’re lying right through your teeth. 

Rei smiles adoringly at you before he leaves your bedroom and minutes later, exits your apartment. As soon as he’s gone and you hear his car pull out of your driveway, you sit down on the edge of your bed and run your hands over your face, trying to fight back the tears threatening to push through and make your night even worse. 

“Fuck, I thought he’d never leave.” 

A very familiar (and sexy, according to some people) voice coming from your window makes you jump right out of your skin and nearly use your quirk to fend off the “threat” you believe they are. However, when a familiar mess of unruly blonde locks and goggles peers around the corner to look into your bedroom, you sigh in relief and irritation. “Keigo!” you scold him as he sneaks through your bedroom window, decked out in his hero’s gear too. 

He gives you his signature dazzling, white-toothed grin as he climbs through your window that even the burn scare that stretched from his jawline down to his neck can distract you from. “What’s poppin’, b?” he asks, using that greeting only he and Dabi use to make you and Rumi cringe. 

“You can’t just sneak up on me like that or come to my bedroom window, especially when Rei is here,” you criticize. “How many times do I have to tell you this shit?” 

Keigo huffs, now standing in your bedroom in the late hours of the night, which is a normal occurrence for the pro hero no. 2 aka Hawks. He’s been crawling through your bedroom window for late-night adventures since middle school when it was just you and him. Rumi aka Mirko, the Rabbit Hero, came later while you attended UA.

Not much has changed since then, except now, instead of your childhood home, Keigo crawls through the window of the condo across the city that you share with Rumi. 

“Oh, relaaax, baby bird,” he chides you. “After the last time I showed up and got a flash of your man’s dick, I learned my lesson. Plus, you act like I’ve never seen you naked before.” He raises an eyebrow at you. “Remember that time in middle school I snuck into the girls’ locker room?” 

You laugh at the memory, remembering the big ass knot he walked around with for days after that you gave him. “Yeah, and I believe that’s when we first met. Shit, that was a long time ago. Weren’t we in fifth grade?” 

“Sixth,” he corrects you, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed. “But we can reminisce more over our decades-long friendship over some wings, shots, and karaoke at Hoshi’s now that I’m off the clock.” 

You sigh, already exhausted from the idea of going out tonight. Especially with Keigo. The man is like a damn kid with candy once he’s got some alcohol in him. “As much as I’d love to hear your drunk ass attempt at singing,” you sarcastically say, “I’m not really in the mood for all that, Kei.” 

By the look Keigo gives you, with his head tilted to the side like a puppy, he can tell this has to do with Rei. He doesn’t even have to ask, which you also hate. The guy can read you like an open book, but you’d expect nothing less from someone you’ve been friends with for years now. 

Instead of saying anything, he just takes his wallet out of his back pocket and flashes it to you, an eyebrow raised: ‘I’m paying.’ You groan, not being able to turn down free wings, booze, and endless karaoke. “Alright, fine,” you sigh, defeated. “Get out so I can change and don’t wake Rumi.” 

Keigo flashes you a prideful grin at his success. “I never wake cottontail,” he scoffs before turning to the window and climbing back out, laughing into the night as he does. 

You sigh and walk to your bedroom closet, readying yourself for a night of total chaos. 

#friends to lovers #keigo takami x black reader #hawks x black reader #feral hawks is the only hawks #black fanfic writer #smutty smut #bnha smut #my fic shit #black coded reader #keigo takami #my works #hawks smut

[gauntletqueen]

wow is superstars really That Bad?? :(

In my opinion, kinda yeah :< (here I go writing a fucking essaybecause just listing complaints as bulletpoints isn't gonna get my thoughts across shafghghaf, this is all based on personal experience and opinion of course!)

(first off, the game uses Denuvo anti-cheat which eats a stupid amount of processing power, slowing down your PC, which is bad because there are better alternatives but SEGA keeps insisting on using this one) On a base level, the game is fine. The characters feel pretty good to control, the graphics are nice, I like that they brought back Fang and introduced Trip whom I love! About half of the soundtrack is very good too! But I just find so many problems that build on that base.

The level design, while fine overall, has a tendency to make you run or jump directly into obstacles a lot, partially because the camera is much to close to the player character. There is just no way to see these obstacles coming until it's already too late, or the enemies will shoot projectiles from off-screen, giving you no warning either. This also means it's harder to see jumps coming, making you fall down a lot. Not necessarily in bottomless pits, but it can be a bit annoying all the same to fall down to a lower route. The game also features several special powers you can activate, and the game wants you to use these at specific moments, but most of these aren't build into the levels fluidly at all. Instead they usually halt the momentum entirely just for a small gimmick that'll be over in a second and, in my experience, never adds anything, aside from the water power which lets you swim freely, which makes for a nice change of pace, but it's only applicable in water stages and using it anywhere else is totally useless. Most of the powers are like that, far too situational, to the point where I kept forgetting they existed unless the game reminded me. I will admit I am just forgetful so maybe this is a me problem.

The game's main selling point, the multiplayer, also makes these problems even worse. The camera seems to choose entirely at random which player it wants to follow, swapping at random as well. The moment a player leaves the screen, they despawn. Given that this game is about running fast, this means that you will despawn constantly. After despawning in this manner, rather than dying, you can press A to respawn next to the surviving player immediately, so it's not the worst, but still incredibly annoying when you can never get into the flow of the game. But it gets worse when one person falls into a bottomless pit, and the camera decides to follow that player. The other player is pushed offscreen, dissapears, and the first player falls to their death, thus killing both. These kinds of problems are a constant and make the multiplayer incredibly frustrating.

The bosses are a big gripe for me as well. In previous Sonic games, Classic especially, if you could hit the boss in their weak spot, you could hurt them. That sounds obvious at first, but a lot of games aren't like that, where you need to wait for a specific attack to leave the boss vulnerable or something. Most bosses in Sonic games don't have that, if you can duck and weave between the boss's attacks and get close enough to land hits quickly, you can really speedrun a boss and feel great about it! In Superstars, bosses can only be hit at certain points, which often isn't visually indicated, causing you to either bounce off of them, or take damage, despite the boss looking no different than when you can hit them. When you hit them, they flash white, indicating their invincibility frames, another common thing for bosses in games, but their invincibility actually lasts much longer than the flashing, which results in the player trying to attack them too early and bouncing off or taking damage again. This already drags bosses out a lot, but on top of that, a lot of bosses take a ton of hits compared to most Sonic games, which, again, breaks the game's momentum. The bosses end up feeling so tedious and long that I started dreading having to fight most of them.

But okay! You can just play the main game in singleplayer! The levels are usually fine and some bosses actually work well! It's not entirely unfun. However, there's more once you beat the main game. (spoilers ahead, though I refrain from talking about specific story elements)

After beating the main story, you unlock a second story. This story is just as long as the previous one, because it's all the same levels, but made harder. This includes the bosses, which were already a pain before, some of which become like torture now.

At this point, the game becomes an endurance challenge, just suffering through harder and harder variants of the same levels and bosses, which, at least in my opinion, stops being fun pretty quickly, since all the earlier issues compound. No new story is learned through this mode either (it's even difficult to understand whether it takes place before or after the main game until the ending which seems like an easy thing to do), so it really just feels tacked on to stretch the game length. and I've been told by a friend that the final boss is so stupidly difficult that it took them like 6 hours to beat. Considering how frustratingly unfun and difficult the game had gotten by the 8th stage, I can believe it! It was, in no small terms, one of the most soulcrushing experiences I've ever had with a video game. It just made me really sad and dejected.

After finally beating it, you unlock a shoddily integrated True Final Boss which comes out of nowhere, and that's a shame because I feel it could've been something neat, and I understand where they were going with it, story-wise, but just needed to be introduced better.

Overall the game has a great basis for a good Sonic game, but ends up getting more and more frustrating and demoralizing as it goes on, and ends up being one of the few games that's actually less fun in multiplayer! Impressive. I really can't say who's at fault here either, since there's so many choices here that I feel can't be due to executive meddling, and it's important to remember that these are the same devs as Balan Wonderworld, Yoshi's New Island and Hey! Pikmin. They don't have the best track record, yknow? Perhaps we'll get a huge patch someday that fixes all of my issues with the game, or maybe the fans will mod it, or maybe not! Whatever! There's better Sonic games to play! Play Mania or 3! Or fan games!!

okay thank you for reading <3

#Oops wow that's uh. #that's a lot #I just kinda wrote the first things that came to mind #if you manage to stay focussed long enough to read it all I am so proud of you and thank you

[thydungeongal]

No one asked but here's my top 5 games of 2023

5. Laika: Aged Through Blood

A weird hybrid of one of those 2D motocross games where you need to balance on your bike while doing cool flips, a shooter with bullet time, and a Metroidvania. Also, starring a cast of furries in a post-apocalyptic setting.

Laika is not a nice game. It starts with a person getting gutted and strung from a tree using their guts. Its story is very dark and seemingly hopeless at times. I have yet to finish it, but it very much seems like one of those stories where things get progressively worse because the people in power are short-sighted and motivated by selfishness. But besides that, it's a dang good game.

Laika really shines in the gameplay department: you'll find yourself doing insane combos where you'll shoot two enemies while doing a backflip only to rotate your bike midair to deflect the bullet of a third enemy, switch to your shotgun to kill one more enemy while using the boost from the shotgun's recoil to dodge another bullet, and finally to completely on accident kill the final enemy because one of the shotgun's pellets ricochet'd off of an enemy's assault rifle.

When the game works it is extremely rewarding and really gets you into that high-octane flow state. It's not quite perfect though: as I said, I have yet to finish it, but thus far I've had enough fun with it to give it a place in my top 5, and the main reason keeping it away from a higher spot on my list is that as apparently dictated by law when it comes to Metroidvanias that take after Dark Souls, the game has a few bosses that are both exercises in frustration while not actually utilizing the gameplay to the fullest. The cool worm in the mines is an early-game highlight, but the goddamn giant chicken pope can go fuck itself.

4. Sea of Stars

Sea of Stars is an indie JRPG inspired by many classics of the genre, but with its most obvious inspiration being Chrono Trigger. Combining a beautiful pixel art style with a turn-based combat system with action inputs in the style of the Mario RPGs and a system based around using appropriate attack types to interrupt enemy attacks and make them vulnerable, on a mechanical level it's a fantastic game. The soundtrack also kicks ass.

Having said that, while the story is by no means bad it's also not terribly memorable? Also, the two main characters (who you choose one to be your main at the start... Which actually doesn't affect anything) are almost devoid of personality while still not being silent protagonists, which I think is the worst of both worlds. Anyway, the cast is saved entirely by the nicest and coolest character in the history of JRPGs GARL!!!

Anyway, I know that comes off more critical, but the truth is it wouldn't be on my top 5 if I didn't think it was a fantastic game. It's a fantastic game that just happens to be the weakest in the main character and story department, but not to the degree where it detracts from the experience. JRPG fans, you should really check this out.

3. Halls of Torment

Vampire Survivors is one of my favorite games of the past couple of years, but it didn't come out in 2023 so I can't put it on this list. You know what did come out in 2023? That's right, Halls of Torment.

Halls of Torment is best described as "what if Vampire Survivors but Diablo instead of Castlevania," and honestly? That simple twist kinda takes it over the top for me. The gameplay loop is much the same: walk around a big map, killing hordes of monsters, picking up experience points and new weapons along the way, upgrading your abilities as you progress. Much like in Vampire Survivors it's a game that tests your ability to avoid enemies while making little spreadsheets in your head at the same time.

I wouldn't say it's better than Vampire Survivors, because for the most part it's just more of the same, but the variety in characters, weapons, and upgrades makes it a unique twist on the formula. If you've wanted to use a flamethrower to take down Diablo's hordes while overdosing on dopamine, this is the game for you.

2. Lunacid

A true throwback and tribute to those PS1 and PS2 days when FromSoft hadn't quite figured out what a Dark Souls is and was mostly making janky mech games and janky first-person dungeon crawlers, Lunacid is basically a spiritual successor to those FromSoft dungeon crawlers.

Lunacid not only nails the atmosphere of pressing loneliness that comes with exploring a mysterious, interconnected underworld, it's also a game that oozes personality and charm. None of its actual gameplay systems are revolutionary, but there's enough variety of weapons, spells, damage types, and possible builds to allow for a very personal gaming experience.

Couple that with a soundtrack that is genuinely spooky at times while also really selling the ennui and loneliness of the setting at others, it's definitely one of the highlights of this year.

1. Cassette Beasts

Cassette Beasts took me completely by surprise and completely consumed me for the next month since its release after which I felt a mighty need to 100% it. It's a rare game that manages to do that to me.

Cassette Beasts is a monster-collecting game in the style of Pokémon but with a few important twists: first of all, you always control a pair of characters instead of just one. Secondly, your characters don't call monsters into battle, they transform into them (this is mostly important in trainer battles where it's entirely possible to take out the trainer's monster form and knock them out before they can transform into a new monster!), and finally its elemental rock-paper-scissors system isn't based on just boosting damage, but on a system of elemental interactions granting buffs and debuffs.

Hit a plant time creature with a fire attack and they're now burning. Hit a glass monster with a metal type move and now there's glass everywhere, dealing minor damage to any character making a melee attack. Coupled with a system where all moves and abilities come in the form of stickers attached to the monsters and which can be detached and attached onto other monsters, you have a monster-collecting game with a lot of tactical depth.

It's obviously not perfectly balanced for competitive play, which will be coming in a future update that'll add online multiplayer, but idk it's an extremely cute, heartfelt, and deep little game. Also, the soundtrack is one of the best video game soundtracks I've had the pleasure of listening to, and also there's a cute doggy.

#cassette beasts #lunacid #sea of stars #halls of torment #laika: aged through blood

[ctommy-chileno]

Here's a list of some ongoing fanfictions I've been following if you want some literature

(Ongoing as in. Updated in the past month or this month)

Butterfly Reign: You know this one, it's the angst full and oddly yellow one. I always end up finding out it updated a day before it released how does that keep happening?. It's a good read, the characters get deeper the more you read it, and yet even with all their hidden lore and ok ish intentions I still want them to suffer because I'm a spiteful bitch. Unreliable narrator to you I believe him.

In the name of the fucking moon: Its a magical girls AU with the benchers and the family, more on the old school monster of the week type of magical girls but with continuity. If you imagine the scenes in your head while reading please add an 80's anime filter over it. Fun to read 👍 I got halfway through and I'm waiting for it to finish so I can binge it.

Guided evolution: Only read this if you have a lot of free time or the time management skills of a lawyer because this here is 300.000+ words and incredibly good. Every chapter I do nothing but worry for my spider son. Hasn't he been through enough I ask, while seeing I'm on chapter 52 out of 75. I know the answer, and it only serves to hurt me.

How to be the biggest trainer ever: Crimeboys go in a pokemon adventure. A very friendly fun read, like the pokemon anime but with your favourite white boys having fun 👍the world is set on gen 1 I think, so use that soundtrack

The stars and their children: Ive only read till chapter 5 and that's enough to know its good (also the fact that I follow the author here on tumblr so I get spoiled every once in a while hehe) This one is more sandduo focused and it has cool sci fi monarchy and it's also very near to end?? I didn't know that. Guess I'll get up to date then. Star tommy did nothing wrong I haven't seen him do much of anything but if he does in the other 19 chapters be aware he did nothing wrong

By the morrow: this one is weird and interesting in the most enticing way possible. What the fuck is going on. I must know all the reasons behind what is happening here. It can be quite macabre so be aware. I only found this one because the author posted the updates to tumblr. Oh yeah the synopsis, superhero au where the ctommy is a nobody who dies and fucks around the town in his ghost form but shit hits the fan incredibly quickly.

Who the ever loving fuck made me a prince: Its an Isekai yipee, our main boy (el ctommy) reads a book where a kid prince dies. L. Then he wakes up as that same kid!!! Oh no!!! Good news is he's reincarnated right in baby zone so he has plenty of time and skill to make sure won't die 👍, its fun, if you like isekais and don't mind some anime trope baby ism then you will live another day

Proof that life hates tommyinnit personally: This is a mystery!!! Spooky!! With touches of angst, perhaps more than some touches but hey the thrill!! The search!! I enjoy the use of the "it's not paranoia if they're really put to get you" tag. Its one of those fics that if it ever gets dropped I would go to the authors house to ask how was it supposed to end. I need. To know. Oh yeah summary: el ctommy is homeless and has many friends in a local mall who don't know that. This is only one (1) of his problems as he's recently gained a stalker, and everything points to being someone he knows ?? Question mark?? Fun.

TommyInnit's Declassified Vigilante Survival Guide: Ah a good old vigilante fic, just like mama used to make. it checks all the marks: benchtrio living together, villain sbi, when the family is founded, heroes yet bad?? and introducing a cool new power to the boy, what a joy! It is funny and it is cool

Our love it's like a burning sun: you've heard of racconinnit, birdinnit, ratinnit, cat shifter innit, possumi- hm I haven't heard that actually, anyways get ready for Red Panda innit, here's a red panda shifter who runs away from mean kingdom and goes to nice kingdom where he can find some family. And sometimes that's all you need to face the horrors

Thunder on my bones: ANOTHER superhero au listen man this one is good trust me. We have superhero boy being sidekick to mean superhero then gets moved to nice family of superheroes and the family is found :)) but also there's villains that want to fuck him up , uh oh! How will they found the family in this conditions! I also really like the design of the tommy superhero outfit, it has a really nice detail that I love imagining in my head ^^

There are more but these are long and easy to get into

#tommyinnit #sbi #sleepy boys inc #crimeboys #longpost #it is a long ass post #i follow some of these authors on tumblr and some on twitter #so ill always be aware qhen its update time

[missmaywemeetagain]

This is possibly one of my favourites most likely IS the best fan fiction I’ve read of anything it’s amazing! I’m just about to read part 8 and I just wanted to ask:

What are you’re top 3 Elvis songs or songs you may listen to when writing this?

Ahhhh, I LOVE this ask because I'm a bit of a music nerd and I really had to think about it. (Also, the fact that I'm at the top of anyone's fanfic list boggles my mind--thank you so much, honey! 💗)

Okay, okay, so here's my thing--I can't listen to songs while I write, but I DEFINITELY get inspired by them and have them on repeat for a thousand years. I currently have several on my repeat playlist, but if i have to narrow them down for Pink Scarf in particular, they would be (I've linked the specific versions below for your viewing/listening pleasure!):

Power of My Love (1969): This my number one for this series, no question. Besides the accuracy of the lyrics, it's sexy as hell, punchy, bluesy, and you can literally HEAR the cockiness in his voice and i just CANNOT. It's hot. It's perfect. I've gone on and on about it before, so I won't go crazy here, but yes. This is it.

One Night With You ('68 Special, second sit down session): If you listen to the lyrics, this one is pretty self-explanatory, but this one is particularly about how he sings this specific version. The man has sex and seduction OOZING out of his pores in this performance (He's so sexy here I'm pretty sure everyone in that audience is pregnant. Hell, it's 54 years later and I'm falling apart over it!), yet somehow, there's still an element of sweetness and humor there. I absolutely LOVE the raw grit and power in his voice during the '68-'70 era and think it really adds to the overall vibe of the song. It's definitely an inspiration in terms of getting into him as a character.

Just Pretend (That's the Way It Is 1970, midnight show): This one isn't 100% lyrically accurate to the story, but it's close enough for me. I think this is one of his most underrated songs/performances because he makes this song sound easy and it is not at all an easy song to sing. It is just such a good ballad and really showcases his artistry as a vocalist. But the moody feeling of this performance just speaks to me in terms of the story. (I'm gonna get a little nerdy as a vocalist here, sorry!) He's telling a story, and reflects that with his vocal dynamics so well--soft to loud, keeping it light and easy one minute then really digging into his baritone (belting high in his upper register in chest voice!!). That vibrato is *chef's kiss* His phrasing is phenomenal. His voice is really starting to develop maturity and control in 1970 and maintaining some of that youthfulness (which I love), without being super heavy (like he gets in the later '70s).

Honorable Mentions: It's Now or Never (1960) (for the young!elvis/the years of pining on his end, and it shows off his vocal range so well) and Craw-Fever from the movie soundtrack (it's seductive as all hell).

Sorry if that was way more than you asked for, baby, but hopefully you enjoy the the insights and the songs--let me know what you think of them!

#be careful once you get me started y'all i'll go on for days #welcome to my dissertation #i love this so much #thank you for asking! #ask #answered #Pink Scarf #if you’re looking for trouble #you came to the right place #elvis #elvis 2022 #elvis presley #elvis movie #austin butler elvis #elvis presley x reader #elvis x reader #elvis smut #austin!elvis x reader #austin!elvis smut

[leiandroid]

otayuri week | day seven - angels & demons (free prompt)

yura a malevolent angel and beka a benevolent demon

@otayuriweek22 - more ramblings about this au under the cut :)

ok, this AU was the hardest to develop since the ideas are half formed and it raises a lot of questions for the verse that the answers are too complicated for me to answer. but i can escape that by NOT writing a fic (which i tried to do and failed horribly).

in my heart of hearts this verse is very hilarious and sexy. so have some ramblings about it instead:

angels and demons have 4 letter names: vita, beka, yura, yuri, mila, jaak, chit, etc… akov is god and ilia is the devil (< i guess, idk, whatever, not important). i think yuri (katsuki) is a demon (gluttony, lust), but that is also not entirely important.

yura and beka meet each other on the shoulders of a nervous and spineless human. they have been sent (punished?) (exiled?) to the mortal realm to act as the human's conscience. yura dwells on the right shoulder and beka on the left.

the human's spinelessness drives yura into rage. he screams into the human's ear trying to influence him to just go punching assholes and jerks that the human lets walk all over him. yura is literally the embodiment of the meme "aren't you tired of being nice a loser? don't you just wanna go apeshit?" when the human only cowers in response yura punches and kicks his neck, which only makes the human scratch his neck (a nervous tic), this makes yura all the more enraged.

beka on the other hand shoulder (haha) whispers and murmurs things into the human's ear that make him more spineless like: it's scary out there, we should stay in, oh, this guy is big we should let him cut in line ahead of us, its okay to get interrupted it wasn't important anyway… etc

idk something to that effect.

they are both so useless to the human being that the human lives out a pathetic life. they spend more time having sexy makeouts on the human's back than doing anything of use.

on yura's malevolence; he has a strong sense of justice and what's right but his problem is his means of achieving them, they are unholy and extremely problematic lmao. beka's benevolence is unbecoming of a demon. he still has the values of what make him demonic but his means are calm and without calamity. chaotic good vs lawful evil typa shit idk

vita is yura's overseer and whenever he has a message to send to yura, a golden halo appears in the air and a soft holy choir sings as clouds part to reveal vita who is glowing all dream-like. (this is super hilarious in my head, the choir is like a soundtrack and can abruptly stop (like a record scratch) if some incredulous shit gets to vita or whatever. it's very over the top and obnoxious)

i imagine the choir is like the first and last thing you hear when interacting with vita. like you'd be chilling on a cloud minding your own business and in the distance the dulcet tones of the choir signals the arrival of vita, and then fades away with him when he leaves lmfao. vita is also especially glowy for an angel, he glows more than most, giving him a very ethereal and dreamlike quality (the extra power he allots to that is worth it and second nature to him at this point)

jaak is beka's overseer and he makes it a point to regularly interrupt the sexy makeouts. when jaak calls, a dark red almost black flame flickers to life and forms a ring of smoke, as he appears in it he always has cluster of succubi hanging off of him who all look exactly alike (isabella) who softly moan, murmur and whisper "king jj" at him in the background

(kind of like in horror media when you hear whispers in the background, but it's constant and less scary sounding and more blush inducing. the anti vita choir lmao)

whenever jaak comes around, yura mimes gagging and puking and covers his ears because, funny enough, worse still than the constant moans of "king jj" is jaak's voice itself.

#otayuriweek #otayuri #otabek altin #yuri plisetsky #otayuriweek22 #yuri on ice #and that's that !!! #this was really fun i enjoyed the hell out of drawing for this event and coming up with ideas #thanks to everyone for liking/replying/reblogging my art :) #and a special thanks to everyone that took the time to read my ramblings since i almost care about them more than the drawings themselves #my art #leiandroid #and happy birthday otabae MWAH

[styrmwb]

I beat Slayers X

losers........ scroll away. u cant HANDEL how cool this game is....

Hypnospace Outlaw is one of my favorite indie games of all time (Slay the Spire is also up there, these two are the peak for me). When I found out there was a sequel I was hyped. It only took my brain... a little under a year to actually play it XD (I gave Hypnospace another playthrough a few days ago cause I never got 100% or did the Plus content so that helped). But giving me more hypnospace universe (the trennisverse, as I've heard) goodness in the form of a game created, in character, by Zane? Fucking Outstanding. I've never really been a boomer shooter guy, so this was like... technically my first one played? I had a blast the whole way through, regardless.

gameplay......

Again, never actually played with my own two hands a boomer shooter before, but of course I've watched Doom gameplay, I've played more modern FPSs. I knew what I was getting myself into, and it felt super easy to maneuver. The weapons were all really fun, and I actually got to feel like each one had its own use, although the Glass Blasta and the Rapid Mutilator were my personal favorites, for power and mobility reasons alike. I loved the map design, which wasn't constant enemies and perpetual combat like I was expecting. There was a lot of downtime that let me explore, see the details put into everything, and to look for secrets. That was my favorite part of the gameplay for sure, although I'm sure for some people they might not like those slower parts and how hard some of the secrets were to find. I know I struggled a bit on some, but I still liked it. I played on the normal difficulty, which felt like it gave me enough of a challenge and enough time to breathe. It was the perfect mix.

atmosfear....

The theming of the game was FUCKING perfect. Hypnospace crushed it with the vibe of early internet forums, and Zane was spot on for a stupid edgy 15 year old of the time. They already mastered the execution, and they got to expand on it further here. The misspellings, the nu metal soundtrack, the graphics, the toilet humor and crude but just innocent enough dialogue, it all gets the vibe exactly correct. Hell, even in real life, with Zane being the irl creator of the game, his twitter, and the way that he advertises his game is perfect. If you don't know what you're getting into, you're gonna think this game is stupid, and I know this cause I've seen quite a few people just not understand what the bit is, and the bit is 50% of the enjoyment of the game. I love it, though. Can't wait for more of this energy in the future.

musik (awsome)

Growing up in the 2000s with younger parents, the general nu metal genre and anything in that era is what I listened to growing up, so this shit is NOSTALGIC for me. I love every song in the game, I love how dirty and rancid it sounds, they literally already got it perfect in Hypnospace, and Slayers X just gives me even more of what I already love. When you're not in combat and you're just walking around, the rock takes a backside for this creepy atmospheric noise which really makes the levels, showing the dingy nature and the (literal) shit. The bonus levels have different soundtracks that get that Doom level sound perfect, which I really appreciated as well.

characterz... (Zane, the coolest guy, and those other idiots.....)

I LOVE how this game's cast feels. The in universe explanations for everything really enhances it. Zane is still that same immature child he was years ago, the game is full of his ego, but you can see in his like, dev dialogue, that he has in fact aged and mellowed out, which is really sweet and saddening to see. The same kid who made bullying pages is now a single dad who clearly loves his kid even if he's not the sharpest tool in the shed, and is dealing with a lot of hardships in life. Like the original game, it's a surface of humor with a really deep inside. You get more of his character by seeing the rest of the cast. Mevin is creepy, obviously evil, definitely not inspired by anyone irl, and Zane's way of physically lashing out at his struggles. Steffanie literally sounds like there's 0 effort being put into her lines, and combined with the secret with Adam, the person that helped Zane code the game, showing annoyance yet still helping him shows that this dude is pathetic but... there's still something in him that makes people want to help him anyways. Mikey is also in on this, putting WAY more effort than anyone would ever need to in this game, but you can tell because of that that there's just something ABOUT Zane that people can't help but want to push him forward for some reason. Again, it's heartwarming and sad, and I love that.

the rest, ig uess...

I don't really know what else to say that I haven't already said; I love this game. It gives me more of what I loved out of Hypnospace, although hyperspecified to Zane (not complaining)

I DO HAVE TO ADMIT THOUGH, I HAVE A SERIOUS BIAS CAUSE ONE OF MY BEST FRIENDS HELPED MAKE IT AND I LOVE TO SEE HER WORK, SHE MADE SOME OF THE LEVELS AND SOME OF THE SOUNDTRACK AND SHE'S SUPER COOL AND AWESOME AND SKILLED SHOUTOUTS TO @headachelikeapillow YOU'RE THE BEST

I got a little easter egg in the game which is super cool :) It warms my heart to see my name lead into a fuckin saw chamber (that has literally stopped every streamer I've ever seen play that level in their tracks, it's hilarious)

sorry if I'm breaking an nda you can kill me if you need

Anyways, with that aside;

10/10. BADASS GAME MADE BY THE AWESOMEST DUDE AROUND.... HELL BE RICH AND FAMOUS FOR SURE AND GET ALL THE GIRLS (LIKE HE DOESNT ALREADY BWL)

#slayers x #textpost #games I beat in 2024 #jared's game ramblings

[tineteenieworld3]

Warning!! Not actually byler doubt, but might be taken that way! Again DON’T read if you take a lot of things as doubt (which is okay, nothing wrong with you, here’s a forehead kiss)

Stranger things as a whole never actually impressed me lmao. Like, of course I love all the characters, but it’s not an overly impressive show or something. I’m not say I’m only in it for byler, but after season 4 and figuring out this insane worlds villain was…a little white boy, anything I was actually impressed by and captivated by got ripped away. It felt kinda lazy to me (personal opinion of course) Again, the show is entertaining, nothing about it is that special right now, but it’s entertaining.

Byler would be different and actually give me the chance to say “okay yes this show is very well done. I’m impressed.”

I think saying people are ‘only in it for that’ is reduced to ship stuff, when in reality a lot of people are just really hoping the show that we like is actually done well. Byler is a narrative that we’re being shown, not just two characters being shipped.

I’m not saying I don’t like the other characters or love them. But no, if byler doesn’t happen, I will not be impressed, I will once again believe the show is mediocre. The show is a lot of fun, but so are millions of others that are also written better in the science fiction sense. And character sense as well, but I do believe ST builds good relationships (rn atleast we shall see).

I might enjoy it, I’ll still have fun, I won’t witch hunt anyone that’s for sure, I might say nothing in the end. But I won’t be impressed by the show even a little bit. Gotta do something special to be something special (in this sense, not in like a human way. Everyone is special no matter what and you’re all amazing)

I think that’s what I’ve been trying to articulate in my brain. When you see stuff that’s like ‘don’t be disappointed if it doesn’t happen’ I get frustrated, because a lot of people are in it for the narrative and for the story. This show is flashy, but we want something else. We want something real and for it it mean something. Byler is this very impressive and well thought out narrative that’s not about cool soundtracks, or powers, or fight scenes, or whatever else.

They never made the sci fi/upside down part intriguing enough or that smart (personal opinion! Not saying I’m right or everyone thinks this way). It was kinda brushed off over and over again. Season one (and two)was amazing I’ll give it that, but through the seasons they added way too much instead of allowing us to understand this place and learn more about it. It was just constant questions and confusion and having to basically study the show to understand it, which, I don’t think makes it super smart or something. That’s how I feel of course, again doesn’t mean I’m in anyway correct. Anyways, ya know what? That’s fine. That’s totally okay, they focused the show more on the relationships and friendships and that’s great!

But again, at this point the only thing, writing wise, I’ll sit down and be like ‘okay, that got me, you impressed me. It wasn’t flashy, it was a beautifully structured narrative.’ Is byler.

Will can have powers, he can fight the white guy with El. That’s all great, but it’s just more flash. I’ll have fun, I’ll watch the edits, but I won’t be impressed.

That’s where I stand. Again, if it doesn’t happen I’ll never ever blame the actors and I won’t even care about the writers, there’s alot of not great/mediocre writers out there, I’ll move on. But yeah, I’ll probably forget all about the show in a month or two and I bet so will a lot of other people.

Maybe they’ll surprise me with something else who knows. I doubt it, but who knows.

Btw this is NOT byler doubt, I still firmly believe it’s gonna happen because I trust my comprehension skills. I believe the writing is leading up to this completely, I study script writing and filmmaking, there’s no part of me that doesn’t believe that’s the writing direction they’re going in.

What I’m saying is, this is how I’d feel or look at it if it doesn’t happen. And kind of a response to Noah saying he hopes people won’t be disappointed. Which, of course he hopes that and of course he can’t say anything. I don’t experience doubt from that, it’s just a response.

I know people freak about byler doubt and stuff, this isn’t what that is, if you feel that way though you can of course block me. This is entirely just my personal opinion, nothing factual.

Really what I’m saying is, Stranger Things is just a bunch of flash sometimes, like storyline wise, there’s also a lot of other amazing aspects, but I don’t care about that (the flash). I don’t care about Will fighting evil with El, I don’t care about epic battle scenes, that’s all expected and we’ve seen that stuff time and time again. I want a good and well done narrative that is pure storytelling, that’s what’ll get me and let me label this as a great show. Of course, one persons opinion doesn’t mean truth and I’ll watch the show and they’ll get my view no matter what. It’s just my thoughts and the thoughts I’ve had while rewatching.

ALL PERSONAL OPINION DON’T COME AT ME

#byler

[xpiester333x]

Final Fantasy 16 Review!!

Good god, what a game.

All review is going to be under a cut since this is a new game and limited to a single system so not everyone has the chance to play it yet. I'm also gonna break the review down from like least spoilery to most spoilery. So if you're on the fence about it you can read the less spoilery parts to get a feel for if its your thing or not. Each progressively more spoilery section is going to be divided with BIG warning letters so you have the opportunity to flee.

This is gonna be a long one.

SPOILER LEVEL: NON-EXISTENT (BASIC GAMEPLAY)

First let me just give a generic gushing about this game. This is absolutely my pick for GOTY. I loved the story, I loved the characters, I loved the game play, I LOVED the music.

I do not typically play action games, like ever. I have old lady reflexes and usually they feel really difficult to me, and then I get frustrated and then I stopped having fun. This game did everything in its power to appeal to people like me as well as people who enjoy suffering. I played this game in story-focused mode which (I'm assuming) has a lower difficulty. It didn't feel braindead simple by any means. It still felt challenging enough without making me mad.

There were also a ton of accessories to help with gameplay if you're having trouble. Accessories that heal instantly for you, or give you a pop up with a prompt to dodge, or one that does auto combo's for you. I didn't end up using these, because I felt I had enough grasp on how to move and dodge that I didn't need them but they definitely offer a lot of accessibility if your like me and inexperienced (and old).

If you like the challenge and suffering there is an action-focused mode with (assuming) a harder difficulty mode meant for people with more experience. They also have challenges in the game where you can replay the "levels" at increasing difficulties.

My first playthrough was about 75-80h. I did all the side quests but I skipped a lot of the challenges. There's a NG+ mode, and like I mentioned a lot of challenges of increasing difficulty so I think your time/dollar value in this game is well worth it, even at the $70 price.

Also if you're ever lost in the story (or if you're just a huge lore nerd) there are "live" lore points available at any point in the game that can provide a quick recap of what's relevant to where you are in the story at any given moment. There's also a loremaster you can visit anytime that holds a compilation of ALL the information in the game. And about half way through the game you get another character that can break every moment down in a timeline that shows you what you've done so far.

AND THE GRAPHICS. My god, they really made use of that new gen tech. The characters were so lifelike in some scenes. I cant even tell you how amazing it was to watch their faces make the most minute twitches, subtle movements that just really brought them to life and it was incredible to see how far tech has come.

THE MUSIC. Oh my god. Soken is really a genius. And the way he managed to marry a lot of FF14 music into some of the fight music really felt like being in on a secret. Idk it was a very epic soundtrack that didn't disappoint.

Also you can pet the dog. As much as you want. And he's the goodest boy.

SPOILER LEVEL: MINOR (CHARACTERS MENTIONED, MINOR PLOT DISCUSSION)

I had high expectations for this game as an FF14 player. I had total faith Yoshi P (producer) would not put his name on anything that would be disappointing. I was not let down.

First I could not get over how much of a world they managed to build. Sometimes it was almost staggering how they managed to not just create a world with various environments and people but fleshed out that world with history, political turmoil, a class system, rebellion, secret organizations... It was like playing Game of Thrones (fun fact, it was an inspiration) with how much was going on and how deep the world building ran. There were times I really just paused the game and went "My god they created a literal universe here".

It did have some plot holes. At then end while my boyfriend and I were exchanging our thoughts, we both had kind of a few "uh weird how they never mentioned ____". I feel like sometimes the game just expected you, the player to suspend disbelief. That aside though, it was a beautifully told story, and while I was playing, none of the aforementioned did anything to detract from my enjoyment of the story as I went.

If I did have one complaint for the story and the lore though, it's how overwhelming and immersion ruining the side quests can get as the game progresses. At the start there's not many side quests. You finish and arc and there is maybe 2-3 side quests available after. But towards the end of the game? You finish a single quest and theres 7-10 side quests to do. The side quests added so much to the game for side characters and lore and world building so I didn't want to skip them. But at some point it also started to feel tedious and distracting to have to do them.

It was VERY MUCH a JRPG. I heard a lot of people saying it didn't feel like an FF game and that it lost the spirit of the franchise but did we even play the same game? This was every bit a JRPG that was very true to its roots and it was the breath of life this franchise frankly needed.

The CHARACTERS. First let me just say:

A CANON GAY?!?!? IN MY FINAL FANTASY?!?!? AND HES NOT A JOKE?!?!

When Dion kissed his lover I fucking screamed and cried. And that the game didn't make him like... stereotypical? He wasn't overly flamboyant, he wasn't used as the butt of any jokes, he wasn't predatory. He was actually an incredible character, very complex, very good hearted. (Also beautiful to look at but they all were.) and when I mentioned minute facial movements earlier, I was specifically impressed by Dion. I feel like they told so much of who he was through just his face that it was stunning.

On the negative side though, I was really unimpressed with Jill's character. There were a lot of interesting and strong female side characters, but some how Jill stayed so flat the whole time. I felt like she was nothing but Clive's girlfriend and they didn't really develop her a whole lot beyond that? Even her entire arc just kinda felt... incomplete? Cobbled together at the last minute and rushed through? I think if there is one super critical thing I have to say about this game its Jill.

Oh and did I mention all the characters in this game are "old"? Like 30s, 40s, 50s, a few in their late 20s. Unheard of for an FF game but it really made a difference.

SPOILER WARNING: MAJOR!!!! (DETAILED CHARACTER AND PLOT DISCUSSION)

Let me just do a little character gush break down:

Clive: Absolutely the best FF protag ever. Like they built him like some meme edgelord but actually he's a cinnamon roll. I am actually so heartbroken for Clive because he had a troubled life from the very start with a mom that absolutely hated him, being the first born but not being the Dominant of the Phoenix, carrying the guilt of killing his brother around with him for 13 years. My heart actually breaks for him

Joshua: Baby boy. Sweet sweet baby boy. I sat in fucking suspense about this boy the whole game. From the moment he was revealed (adult him anyway) I fell in love with him and then spent the rest of the game saying "please don't kill Joshua please don't kill Joshua" I bit my nails down to nothing every fight sequence. My one criteria for not quitting this game on the spot was if he died before he reunited with Clive. If that had happened, there wouldn't be this 3000 word review rn.

Jill: The most disappointing character. I couldn't even hate her, because I didn't feel like there was enough to her to hate. She loved Clive. They worked in the whole deal about her feeling guilty (suddenly) for all the death she caused as Shiva but then as soon as Clive won the battle for her she didn't feel bad at all ever again? Idk I feel like they just didn't really care about Jill but needed a female lead so she was made?

Cid: Daddy. Cid was a great character that wasn't with us nearly long enough.

Gav: GAV. G A V . I LOVED Gav. Like from the moment he appeared I genuinely thought he was going to be a pretty minor side character and I was sad because I really loved him right from the start. But then we got to spend more and more time with him and man I LOVED him. He was such a ray of sunshine, big golden retriever energy, loved this baby boy so much. There was one point in the game where the party was Clive, Joshua, Gav and Torgal and I said to my boyfriend "they have such potential to ruin my life right now". Anything happening to Gav was my other condition that would make me stop playing the game lmao.

Anabelle: Listen. I have never hated a character so much. This bitch ruined her children's lives with a smile on her face. This bitch massacred bearers for funsies. And at the end she got to commit suicide ezpz? There really is no justice in the world.

Dion: I think I gushed enough about Dion up above but man I can just do it again. I don't know how they made me love a character that was like, barely in the game so much but they did. They made him bear all the guilt and pain and deny himself anything good and become a martyr and they just made me love him.

Now about the FIGHTS. I said the combat system was fun but I didn't even mention the Primal fights. That fight with Titan Lost? FUCKKK. It was so epic my blood was bubbling. The fight with Bahamut? CHILLS. I thought Primal fights were gonna be kinda gimmicky and cinematic and to some extent they were (VERY cinematic) but they felt so high stakes and fast paced it made your heart pound, even if you were only minimally participating during a cut scene. The devs kept saying they really wanted to give the primal fights a sense of enormity and they 100% accomplished that.

SPOILER WARNING: BIG BIG MAJOR!!!! (ENDING DISCUSSION)

The fucking ending. This fucking ending.

First of all when I say this was every bit a JRPG, I mean it so literally. The formula is all there. Pick a human trait and then fight god about it. In this case human will making them prone to destruction means god, Ultima, should take back what he gave them. And then it all cumulates in to this end fight where Clive is powered by friendship and punches god in the face lmaooo.

But it was good. Even recognizing it was cheesy at all get out didn't make it less good. (I mean ffs he says "The only fantasy here is yours. And we shall be its final witness"). It made me giddy tbh. It was an exciting fight, and epic battle, and I felt so nostalgic because it felt so classic at the same time. It was beautiful (even if I really sucked at it and forgot to get pots beforehand lmao).

And then the fucking end. Listen. Listen. Was that flashback of Clive meeting baby Joshua really necessary. Was any of that flashback really necessary? Trust the writing and dev team that killed Haurchefant to throw that in there and make sure my heart was thoroughly crushed.

I already said I was biting my nails about Joshua dying but I really wanted to believe they were gonna some how rez him and everything would be fine but no they just left him there dead. And then they also killed Clive? I did not see that coming at all. I saw Joshua coming, I dreaded it the whole game for a reason but killing the main protagonist?? I never saw that coming.

And I sobbed. Like a baby. From the moment Ultima was finally defeated until the end credits I literally just sobbed (quietly to myself so that my boyfriend who was a little behind me in the game wouldn't hear). In fact I cried so much I'm pretty sure this whole review is a grammar and typo mess because my eyes are sticky. It left a hole in my chest.

I DID read a comment that said they both lived because in the post credit scene there is the book Final Fantasy written by Joshua Rosfield and I understand that but idk it didn't feel like they lived? Aside from that book being there nothing about the end really confirmed anything? Idk it was a weird post credit scene or maybe I'm just dumb and didn't understand. SO if you finished the game and actually sat through my garbage so far, you tell me what I missed.

I'm sure I will come up with another 30 random things to gush about when I post this and I know I didn't cover everything I even wanted to talk about before I started, but this is like, way too long already for a review. Basically, in conclusion, I really loved this game. I really highly recommend it to anyone and everyone that can play it.

#final fantasy 16 #final fantasy xvi #final fantasy 16 spoilers #final fantasy xvi spoilers #easy as pie #pie plays #game reviews

[dustedmagazine]

Ladytron — Time’s Arrow (Cooking Vinyl)

Photo by Wendy Redfern

Ladytron already had their big comeback. The formed-in-Liverpool, now-international quartet took a few years to assemble their starkly dystopian 2019 self-titled record, shortly before the rest of the world became dystopic in new and interesting ways. Ladytron was practically the model of (one version of) a triumphant return: bigger and bolder and weightier than ever, a real Statement (but with tunes). Everyone’s senses of time seem increasingly fuzzy, but the gap between its release and that first period of chaos and uncertainty seems vanishingly small in retrospect. In 2023, though, no matter how cautious or reckless any of us are being, the simple fact is that living in a still unmanaged pandemic (not to mention… everything else) has become in some way routine. None of the systems of power, control and repression that Ladytron evoked have gone away, but the horrible truth is that humans will adjust to just about anything, even constantly shrieking alarms. Fittingly enough, the first record Ladytron have made in this new normal is less about noticing those structures and more about limning the small moments of beauty, joy and freedom that can still be found within them.

This thematic and tonal shift doesn’t require much of a change in sonics. Mira Arroyo and Helen Marnie’s vocals still feel like each syllable is carefully placed, calibrated to summon up emotions without necessarily directly expressing catharsis. The music sticks to the same general lane Ladytron have trafficked in since they (plus Daniel Hunt and Reuben Wu) moved away from the straightforward throwback synthpop of the first two LPs with 2005’s dreampop-adjacent Witching Hour. That record really unlocked Ladytron’s sound and they haven’t exhausted its possibilities yet; the pulse and stomp of opener “City of Angels” or the sparkling twilight balladry of “Misery Remember Me” are classic examples of what Ladytron has always done well and why it’s good to have them back. 

Especially on the back half of Time’s Arrow, though, there are some new wrinkles. Has Ladytron ever had a song as plainly joyous as “The Night,” with the synths surging warmly around Marnie almost cooing “so let’s go crazy”? It’s followed directly by “The Dreamers,” a little more downcast but still sounding like the soundtrack to running away with someone. Elsewhere “California” almost pleads for the titular state to “make us happy” (albeit on a track that sounds like slowly sliding down the side of a glacier). As you dig into the lyrics none of the songs here are facilely happy, or in denial about the same emotional and structure issues Ladytron brought to the surface. But if that last record was about coming to terms with living in an ongoing disaster (ecological and otherwise), Time’s Arrow is more about navigating life after that kind of realization. The day in/day out still happens, time’s arrow (as Arroyo sings on the closing title track) still glides through your heart. 

As is common on Ladytron records, Marnie sings most of the songs but Arroyo’s couple of leads are crucial. In addition to time another big throughline here is the always-shifting power memory, and on the first side’s “Flight From Angkor” she faces it directly: “memory's a hall of mirrors / echoing for years.” Things keep happening, and the longer they do the more hazy our grasp on that moment of realization we had gets. What is there to do but draw together, find safety and community where we can, try to change things, and dance? 

Ian Mathers

#ladytron #time's arrow #cooking vinyl #ian mathers #albumreview #dusted magazine #synthpop #dream pop #dystopia

[minervas-sandwich]

I made brief notes on every song as they came on because I have a bad memory, so here are some of my surface level passing thoughts on hearing these for the first time

Austria so real for just going “yeah its about a poet who’s been dead for 173 years”

I’m sorry that Poland got screwed over and didn’t get the song they wanted :/ song was pretty good tho

Serbia is the emo gamer anthem we needed. It was also written for the transmascs. Don’t ask why it just was

Something about France’s song just was so inherently french in nature

Spain had the first song that made me go “OH BANGER” and I love them and hope they place well; the strings hanging down was so fun and creative

Sweden’s song is good but she looks like she’s in a hydraulic press

Albania also a BANGER and they also seem like they’re doing a summoning ritual. Also they’re all a family and I love that for them

Italy. If you’re going to bother to use trampolines, actually do something with them please. You just had a couple guys doing small bounces in the background. Do something crazy. Please. I’m begging you, I want crazy trampoline stuff

Estonia was so powerful and definitely my favorite ballad of the whole contest

Finland- what is there to say about Finland that hasn’t been said already? EDM rave banger but make it slay

I really really liked Czechia’s staging and their use of the screens in the background, it was super cool and did a lot to emphasize their song rather than distract from it. Their harmonies were really cool, too!

Australia’s song is going into my regular playlist to listen to all the time

I feel like I can see Belgium’s song becoming a drag queen staple. Like every other season on RuPaul’s someone does this one. And honestly I think that is to its credit

Moldova also seems like a summoning ritual and the guy in the mask playing the flute and running around really did not do anything to dissuade that feeling

Ukraine’s song was really really good, just not my personal vibe. I thought the use of the screens they had was super cool!

Norway is a feminist power anthem and also sounds like it could fit into a Pirates of the Caribbean soundtrack (this is a good thing)

Germany held *nothing* back and they’re so real for it. Slay. They did so much

Lithuania’s song felt very gospel

Slovenia had a banger bass line; also a song going into my playlist

Croatia also a vibe; no matter your opinions on their music we stan because they’re leftist punks who make fun of nationalism. They got arrested once for performing naked and protested it on the grounds of having corks in their buttholes. Icons and legends

UK’s song feels like it was written for tiktok. Also her voice doesn’t have enough breath support

#personal #eurovision #eurovision 2023

[demizorua]

1,3,11,15,21,23,31,37,43,53,74,76

ask game

TYSM!!!!!! :D!!!!!

1. Favorite Type

POISON!!!! i LOVE poison types!!!! they're so fun to use, and so many of their designs are so COOL, and i love how many resistances they have!!!! adding the poison type always makes a pokemon more fun to use, imo!!! i've loved them even before they got on offensive use with fairy types!!!! them being defensive is enough for me :D plus a lot of my favorites happen to be poison types, like trubbish, zubat, and drapion!!

3. Favorite Dual Type

oooooo this is HARD!! hm... pre-gen 6 dark/ghost is fun... i really enjoy poison/dark with their one weakness to ground, and ground/steel is also super fun, like excadrill!

but i think my overall favorite has gotta be poison/ground, like clodsire and the nidos!! the resistances of poison types (my favorite defensive type and fave type overall), and the offensive power of ground types (my favorite offensive type and second favorite type overall)!! and i mean. how can i ever say no to STAB earthquake.

11. Favorite Trial (Sun & Moon)

hrmmm. it's been a while since i've played gen 7... i think my favorite is the ghost trial!! it's a creative concept, with the photos, even if it's along the same vein of "get Things and battle pokemon and then Final Battle" that every trial and many gyms follow, and i mean. i love the mimikyu room. it's a nice touch!!

15. Favorite Shiny Pokémon

OH JEEZ... minior. i love shiny minior so much, even if it's kinda hard to see it when you have one.

honorable mentions to shiny suicune, shiny wooloo, and shiny hisuian zorua/zoroark, which is Significant because i don't really like shiny unovan zorua/zoroark very much.

21. Favorite Legendary/Mythical Pokémon

uhhHHHHHH....... suicune!!! it's so nice looking, i love when it appears in the anime (barring... anything that happened in journeys i can't speak for that) and it's so nice!! shiny suicune specifically.

honorable mention to landorus therian. i like how its paws have those flattened claws on them, like for digging! because it tills the land! and also... landorus therian. vgc moments.

23. Favorite Music Track From A Pokémon Game

VILLAGE BRIDGE. ABSOLUTELY VILLAGE BRIDGE. when i first found village bridge i adored its music, and then i found the musicians !!!!!! aaaa!!!!!!!!!! and i love that it has lyrics. people often cite roxie as the first in-game pokemon soundtrack to have words/lyrics, but she's not!! village bridge is!!!! i adore this song it is so near and dear to my heart

everyone please listen to the village bridge with buildup. oughhghh.

31. Favorite Fire Type

mmmm..... volcarona. love that bug :D the design is really nice, and it's so fun to use!! bulk AND power, and quiver dance?? HELL yeah!!!

honorable mentions to. fletchinder. and ash's litten specifically because. i am going 2 cry <3

37. Favorite Flying Type

DODRIO. nobody EVER talks about dodrio and it makes me so sad!!! i love that guy!!!!!! they're so cool and you can ride them around and i just !!!!!! dodrio!!!!!!!!!!

honorable mentions to tropius, staraptor, minior and gliscor!!

43. Favorite Electric Type

mmmmmmmmmmm......... i think galvantula wins this? it's either galvantula or luxray. i love them both sooooo much, and it's interesting bc i don't really have any other close runner ups besides them! zeraora as a third place, maybe?

53. Favorite Dragon Type

HYDREIGON!!!!! ohhhh hydreigon my best friend. i love them so much, they're so fun to use and busted, but it feels like a REWARD when you can use one, and the way they're used for subtle storytelling in the gen 5 games makes me CRAZY god i love gen 5 and i love this big ol dragon.

honorable mention to applin, if only because i love the joke and refuse to let people mock them. it's a wyrm in an apple!!! that's a good joke!!!!! also goodra i really like goodra.

74. Favorite Alolan Version of a First Gen Pokémon

ooo..... alolan muk. i love that it's an oil spill but like one of the colorful ones, and i think the like. crystallized poison? that's so cool!!!

plus.... i mean.... poison/dark type <3

76. A Pokémon You Feel is Underrated

i've got multiple

zubat (it's a really good pokemon to use once it gets wing attack, or right away with recent gen leech life, and we shouldn't blame them for being in caves. they live there. they're bats!!!)

natu (they're so cute!!!! i love the little guy c'mon. little friend <3)

sudowoodo (I LOVE THEM!!!!! plus i mean. their japanese name my adored. wish that joke didn't get lost. watch M21, sudowoodp my beloved)

and ivysaur! everyone loves bulbasaur, and venusaur gets a decent amount of attention, but ivysaur is my favorite in the line and i'd love to see more of them!!!

thank u so much for asking!!!! :D!!!!!

#zorua.txt #ask game #dragontiger357 #pkmn

[coro-chan6]

A "Power Polys" drabble-

Disney Night

Summary - Emily is very excited for Disney night. Her partners? Not so much.

Warnings - poly! relationship, gn! character, Disney movies, confusion, subtle mentions of OCD, fluff

Words - 531

Emily walked home with a pep in her step. Even though her feet hurt like no one’s business from dancing for hours, she was excited because today was Disney night. She and her partners would sit on their living room couch and watch any movie that Emily wanted.

If you didn’t catch on already, Emily really loved Disney movies. Anything Disney, really. She would cut her sandwiches into the shapes of her favorite Disney characters, she had “Chicken Little” and “Big Hero Six” stickers all over her laptop, and she made sure to reference Disney at least once a day. She had to, but this was one of her little habits that she didn’t mind.

“We are watching “The Good Dinosaur”,” Emily told her partners as she sat on the couch. She repositioned her fluffy blanket once, then twice. Then once more for good measure.

“Okay, sweetheart,” Francis’ southern drawl drifted from the kitchen.

“Didn’t we watch-” Agatha started.

“I know,” Francis interrupted, “At least this one won’t make my ears bleed.”

Emily knew her partners didn’t like Disney cartoons to the extent that she did. She knew they were only watching them for her, but she couldn’t help but feel a bit guilty for making Francis’ ears bleed. She hadn’t even noticed!

Francis and Agatha crowded on the couch on either side of Emily, popcorn and other little snacks in hand. 

“Agatha… Francis, you don’t have to watch “The Good Dinosaur” with me. I understand if your ears haven’t recovered,” Emily turned to her blonde-haired girlfriend, “Especially you, Francis. How come you didn’t tell me your ears had bled?”

Francis looked confused as Emily prodded at her ears. What in the world was she talking about? It was then, with a quick glance at her partner giggling behind Emily that Francis realized that Emily had overheard her conversation in the kitchen.

“Sweetheart, my ears didn’t actually bleed.” 

Emily was confused, “I don’t understand.”

“My ears didn’t bleed, baby. It was just a figure of speech. Some of the movies you watch, we’ve watched thousands of times with you, and I could hear some of those soundtracks in my sleep… still can.” Agatha giggled louder.

“That doesn’t mean we want to stop having Disney night with you. Right, Agatha?”

Agatha was still cackling, “Yeah, yeah…”

Francis shot her partner ‘the look’. Emily was still extremely confused but figured if she just stayed quiet, she would figure it out soon enough.

“What I mean to say,” Agatha started, “Is that we will gladly watch “The Good Dinosaur” with you - and any other cartoon you want to watch. We don’t care as long as you’re happy and we get to hang out with you.”

Emily smiled. Her partners were the best she could ask for. They really thought that them not wanting to watch Disney with her was going to make them upset. Francis even had to resort to using a morbid figure of speech that Emily still didn’t understand. In all honesty, Emily would gladly watch Disney all by herself, but she appreciated their compassion.

“Okay,” Emily said grabbing some of Francis’ popcorn, “Silence yourselves so we can get this movie started.”

#my ocs #queer love #disney #oc character #nonbinary #polyamorous #ocd #emily is confused

[chemicalbrew]

2021 game list

aka 'I finally got tired of having to scroll really far to edit the 2022 list because I wanted originally to fuse two years in one, like a fool'

I'm pretty sure the bulk of this was made in... spring\summer 2021, but there were a bunch of games I didn't write anything for until this year, as will be evident later. This is long as hell, as you would expect.

'Veronica, why didn't you have a 2021 list ready in time???'

A question that nobody asked, but one that really needs answering, because in 2021, I gamed too much, in addition to other things. I'll make additions to the behemoth of a document that never saw the light of day in time in italics.

A lot of things have happened this year. I learned how to swim, for one! I graduated high school, too, and got into my dream university (though, honestly, it's just about as messy as any other uni in the end). I got a reasonably powerful and fully functional PC all to myself (it doesn’t even compare to the old husk I had to use in my school days!) (this year, I finally got a good phone as well, which influenced the current year's list a fuckton). And I could finally fulfill the one dream I held on to for the past two and a half years and get a Switch for myself (insert bittersweet laughing here)!! As a result, when it came to gaming, the possibilities became nigh endless. Instead of praying that a game I kinda like even manages to launch, I could dive headfirst into anything that catches my eye with confidence and no hesitation! I had so many options, in fact, that I ended up making a Backloggd account to assist myself. (yup, still helpful, though I'm much more loose about keeping track of shit now) Almost anything I played that isn’t on this list can be found there, if you’re curious! This, however, turned out to be a double-edged sword. More options means more garbage to wade through, and yet the best games tend to draw you in quicker than you think. (so true bestie)

After this, a list of games that did nothing but disappoint me that year followed. I don't want to dwell on it too much now, but I'll still mention their names:

Night in the Woods (PC, 2017) - I was way too old to be their target audience and came out thoroughly disappointed, especially in the character cast and soundtrack.

Children of Morta (PC, 2019) - the progression is too slow, the cast isn't appealing enough, there's a lot of redundancy to the point where I dropped the game. However, it was fairly pretty and I liked the narrator enough to listen to his extra works.

Spiritfarer (PC, 2020) - best described not as ‘a cozy management game about dying’, but’ as ‘much ado about nothing’. These two reviews give voice to some of my frustrations better than I can. PS. Love lighthearted ableism!

Aria's Story (PC, 2018-2019) - A very little game that has nothing of value to tell you (that hasn't been done to death already) and has cheap jumpscares every five minutes.

Hyper Light Drifter (PC, 2016) - I don’t get this one. The idea of telling a story without words seemed appealing at first, until I realized that I actually need words in my stories!

Moonlighter (PC, 2018) (confusing gameplay, boring music and plot)

OMORI (PC, 2020) (I think I have an allergy to this game)

Yume Nikki (PC, 2004) (sorry, but nah, I don’t get it)

Long Live the Queen (PC, 2012) (more like Long Live the Guide)

Owlboy (PC, 2016) (why would you do my boy Otis like that? Also, my apologies to Rads)

UnderMine (PC, 2019) (should have been called UnderGrind)

Baba is You (PC, 2019)  (actually not bad, but brain is fry)

Hand of Fate (PC, 2015) (the font hurt me, there’s nothing really good here other than narration)

Minute of Islands (PC, 2021) (should have been a picture book, otherwise it’s a neat interpretation of ‘no man is an island’)

...'okay, but surely not everything you played was garbage?'

Right you are, hypothetical reader! And this is how I would like to introduce what once was the 'honorable mention' section of my record. These notes have actual substance to them and are formatted similarly to my 2020 list! There is a game that is of particular importance (because I ended up playing its sequels in 2022) at the end of this section.

Hades (PC, 2020) [♪ House of Hades]

Yes, I get to put the game of the previous year here again, because it is my list. All things considered, I love Hades too much not to use the opportunity to mention it again! I played it till March to wrap up some of the tasks that are more… out there (learning to play without god mode, chasing extra dialogue, and climbing up in ranks), and it was fun pretty much the whole time. Streaming it was a grand time while it lasted, as well (not very long at all). All the mediocre roguelikes I touched this year fail to measure up to Hades in any capacity. 💖 Still true - my interest in roguelikes\-lites has naturally dropped since then, but Hades' excellency was a major factor in this.

Sayonara Wild Hearts (PC, 2019) [♪ Doki Doki Rush]

Kiss Your Ex And Lie About Your Genre On Steam: the game. The only thing preventing this from being a game that is barely worth mentioning is its really good soundtrack. (I played it about a quarter of the way through before realizing that a far better option than standing still and letting the music play out would be to just watch the whole thing.)

I also like the general style of it and find it pretty unique (even though Katana ZERO did something similar in a much more cohesive and enjoyable fashion), but playing it was an exercise of frustration that prevented me from appreciating the awesome landscapes. Parallel Universes is a pretty incredible level concept, yeah, but I did NOT handle it well.

I didn’t jive with any of the symbolism either (I guess it’s gay though. Good for them), however, I am still glad something as creative as this exists, even if it is clearly not cut out for me. Can’t believe I let this game gather dust for months, when I could have just given up. lol

A Hero and a Garden (PC, 2019) [♪ Shop Bell]

A clever little mix of visual novel and clicker game that manages to have an interesting story, despite starting out with the oldest of cliches (hell yeah, there's a princess!). Music is really sweet too, and even in a runtime as short as ~2 hours, you end up feeling for the protagonist. If you don't have much free time, spend it on this for a complete experience.

Doki Doki Literature Club Plus! (PC, 2021) [♪ Dreams of Love and Literature]

PM died for this.

Ohhh… A horror VN classic… Yeah, sure. It’s actually not that great, but some of the music is downright incredible (i.e. the linked song and about half of the songs added in the new edition), and it was a game that undeniably helped and inspired many people. I can’t say I regret spending time with it, but it didn’t impress me, either. The scares got ever so slightly more predictable over time, and it became clear that all they were aiming for is shock value. This game reminds me of Night in the Woods in the way that it had been severely overhyped by contemporary teenagers.

At least Yuri was pretty, I guess?.. But really, all the girls did was represent some overdone anime -dere cliche. It was very likely done on purpose, which is something to be respected for sure, but the fandom ran with it anyway, cause fandoms be fandoming. Shame! (Monika is the obvious exception, but the way they built her up was through the simplest of text dumps, oh, and they also gave her a Twitter account or something. Come on, get creative!)

Rhythm Doctor (PC, 2021) [♪ Rollerdisco Rumble]

Healing hearts and minds with the power of rhythm, hell yeah! Absolutely incredible concept! Combine that with amazing pixel art and animation that makes the small world come alive, the incredibly flashy aesthetic that draws attention from the outside and utterly fucks with your performance on the inside, and an overall message that both promotes peace and showcases humane struggles of a medical profession… the way it ends up going places you wouldn’t quite expect is just so good. And through all that, the game retains its charm and positive vibe! I want a bigger scope, though – it was over far too quickly. Oh, and a little more accessibility options wouldn’t hurt. 

The flashiness of this game reminds me of Rhythm Heaven trying to mess with the player, but pushed to an extreme, which is delightful. I had to clear most of the later levels with my eyes closed, and rewatching them later was quite an unusual and fun experience!

Coffee Talk (PC, 2020) [♪ Come Closer]

Pretty (the pixel art reminded me a lot of the PC-98, which is never a bad thing. Oh, dithering, my beloved!) and has an atmosphere, but not nearly as impactful as a game from later on this list with the exact same premise.

Can be good for a getaway\escape kinda game, and the decision to focus the soundtrack on the lo-fi genre is wonderful, but the story has no staying power, and not even the ‘make your own latte art’ gimmick ended up working out, because the process would always feel… either too realistic or too finicky, I wouldn't be able to tell. I’m no barista! Oh, and I guess there was some message about overworking employees?.. I literally forgot.

Ys: Memories of Celceta (PC, 2012-2018) [♪ Wise Man]

So, this was my… *checks notes* fifth Ys? I started with Oath (okay… I guess…), then I played I&II (and wrote about that in 2020) and dabbled in Origin (it was… exhausting to play, but well-written), and I played VIII this year before this (more on that later). So I thought I had enough experience (and understanding of the fandom’s general opinion on Celceta) to know what to expect when I began my journey in this game. Boy, was I wrong! But still, it's obvious that the earliest iteration of the party system would be worse than VIII's, and playing the games in the order that I did may have screwed my impression.

First, the good things. I actually grew unreasonably attached to the artstyle of this game. I loved the fresh take on a younger Adol just starting to give in to his lust for adventure, and the other party members had quite good designs too (especially Duran. I dunno, I can’t help but love that husk of a dude). Some of the locations were endlessly charming (I loved running laps around Casnan with its upbeat music and fun NPCs, and was awed by how pretty Danan ended up looking for a Falcom game). The world was decently fun to explore overall, but I think most of that fun came from seeing what is an early draft of what would later become Lacrimosa of Dana.

The music is absolutely lovely! Everyone loves Ys for constantly offering hardcore rock guitar bangers or whatever, and while Celceta isn’t without a couple of these, I ended up appreciating far more how much calmer it sounds as a whole. There are plenty of tracks that offer you much needed downtime, and the sound of the game feels more mellow than your usual Ys soundtrack.

The gameplay\battle system was overall serviceable, with a few nags in its way - movement felt more restricted than before, and breaking enemies’ guard felt more tedious than necessary. But hey, there’s no raids in this game! hahahahaha-

That ending single-handedly ruined a decent game and is as bad as everyone said it was. I broke down in hysterics when it actually happened. Also, I am still mad about getting only 99.3% map completion! That part of the game is crazy!!

Ib (PC, 2012) [♪ Uneasiness]

My memories of this are quite scattered, but I really enjoyed it, so have this heap of thoughts!

Aria’s Story, but good enough to leave an impression on you, since Gary is an actual character. He serves as a great mentor figure – even without coming across as stiff or all-knowing, he has a lot to give and teach Ib, which makes for a good dynamic that contrasts his disheveled looks well. It’s clear he cares about the girl, but is reluctant to show it clearly enough for her to understand fully, but she clings on to him as her last hope anyway. It’s pretty damn beautiful, actually. also the handkerchief in the true ending omg

The other girl with the yellow rose… Mary… good contrasting character, but her betrayal could be seen from a mile away, which, I guess, is the point, but still not satisfying.

Music is somewhat good too, and the game nailed the aesthetic of an art gallery (including successfully subverting expectations).

The jumpscares rely more on the physical suddenness of it all rather than psychological pressure, and it works out really well – even if you’re cringing, your body is affected. Plus, they fit well thematically, given the protagonists’ age. Speaking of which, the ??? thing (if Ib doesn’t know a word, you won’t know it either, basically) is clever, but gets old a little too quickly.

The idea of linking their life energy to fragile but sharp roses is somewhat creative and executed very well, especially regarding Gary’s blue rose.

The chase sequences were kinda annoying, but not nearly as awful as Aria, thank god.

Basically, this was the game that, alongside OFF, convinced me I might be into RPG Maker games, but, unfortunately, I've yet to find anything else that matches Ib and OFF's energy in this niche\'subgenre'. (And of course, this is talking about the version available as freeware, and not this year's rerelease, which I am curious about, but have no plans of playing.)

Butterfly Soup (PC, 2017) [♪ Thought Projection]

The most wholesome VN I have ever seen. The art is very pretty and expressive without being overwhelming (and of course, the focus on purple\pink is extremely satisfying to me personally). Music is cute and never gets annoying; it may be royalty-free, but it was chosen with clear care. 

This game, in my opinion, is genuinely funny without coming across as insincere, and I don’t feel inclined to agree with those who tend to say its ‘uwu humor’ did not age well, because I personally laughed at most of it (the Zero Escape reference got me, man)! And even if I hadn’t, it would still, ironically, fit well with the overall message (which is that growing up and learning new things about yourself is good, and it’s fine not to know what you’re doing for a while, as long as you stay true to yourself and your friends)!

Some of the impact was lost on me due to the focus on America as a setting/baseball, but it's fine, since this focus was chosen with intent. Ultimately, the game carries the same message and does similar things to Night in the Woods, except successfully, without having to rely on random gameplay changes or ‘hip’ artstyle.

Evan’s Remains (PC, 2020) [♪ Whales]

The best thing about this game is its pixel art – just detailed enough for you to appreciate it, but not excessively so. The backgrounds in particular are nothing short of stunning.

Unfortunately, nothing else in Evan’s Remains manages to match that standard. The music, for the most part, is just there, the puzzles, while creative, can be somewhat irritating and repetitive, and the story, while starting out decently, has an ending that might be worse than Celceta’s and ends up making about as much sense. I would recommend you to watch footage of this game, but only if you like pixel art. It won’t take long, I promise.

Platform fighters I tried to give the light of day to

Super Smash Bros. Brawl - fun for just messing around in classic modes like the SSE and Multi-Man Brawl. Really, you can't ask much more of it.

Rivals of Aether - the most polished one that isn't Smash by far, really pretty and fun in general, but a little small in scope. I owe its soundtrack my life (or more accurately, one track. It's legit amazing to study to...)

Brawlhalla - as usual, don't trust a free game to be good. That's all.

In general, the copycats simply fail to capture the charm and spirit of Smash Bros, and Brawl is as much of a casual's game as one would expect. :)

All the idle\incremental games that ate up my time this year (yes, I like these too much, I know)

Namely, these, ordered from best to worst:

Kittens Game (actually amazing for killing boredom. the flavor text is extremely cute and the resource management is quite advanced)

Cookie Clicker (the classic. I lost my garden due to mods, and so shall never speak of this wretched curse again)

Tap Wizard (ironically, the only one on the list I'm still playing - now side by side with the sequel. Though the praise I gave to Kittens is still deserved.)

Trimps

Grimoire

Liquids

Exponential Idle

Shoutout to r/incremental_games for enabling me to dive deeper into this toxic, awful, beautiful genre of timewasters :)

Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney (DS, 2007) [♪ Trial]

AKA ‘the one where Phoenix done fucked up’. First AA I played the Android version of, and it held up pretty well (certainly better than emulating DS via RetroArch)! The remastered graphics annoyed me less than expected, and the gorgeous OST (best in the series so far, unless you count Investigations, and overall a glow-up and joy to my ears [< Still true. I might be ready to shill AA6 music any day, but nothing can top the excellency of AJ music even now.]) has remained intact.

I don't think this game ever reaches the highs that AA3 did, but it is certainly not for a lack of trying. I can understand the sentiment behind 'being done with Phoenix', for sure, and him still being here proves to be a sign for the beginning turmoil of the series and the struggles that Takumi is only now beginning to see the end of with GAA.

I didn’t find myself exactly attached to any of the main characters (okay, maybe Klavier awakened something or other in me, who can say [so valid, but girl... your personal prosecution turmoil is far from over]), but that has been the case for basically the entire main series as well, so that’s not surprising to me personally.

4-1 was more fun than I expected it to be based on popular opinion, and I got a good chuckle out of the ‘’’Russian’’’ waitress and the mental image of hobo!Phoenix eating borsch, but it’s still no 3-1. 4-2 and 4-3 especially were less than impressive, and overall the game got steadily worse over time.

I still appreciated it for trying to pave a new road for the series, for, again, having a fantastic soundtrack, and for making Phoenix into a lovable utter failure (should have stayed that way, his days were indeed over), but… AJ is not the best Ace Attorney by a long shot. 4-4 was pretty damn good though, and I loved how the jurist system was integrated in both story and gameplay, even if the threat it tried to present fell way short. Also, Vera Misham is the cutest girl we’ve ever had to defend.

PS. Klapollo have bigger gay energy than Wrightworth do, fight me. 2022 me here to report that I no longer want to fight anyone, because in the end it turned out I'm the loser who got somewhat into Blackmadhi. And also I now think the two ships in question are about equally good.

Fire Emblem: Awakening (3DS, 2012) [♪ Chaos]

I actually had barely played the game throughout either year, but it still deserves this spot.

A game that aged better than expected. Really fun to play on an actual big screen (and with savestates – the Mila's Turnwheel of yore). Music is still godlike after all these years. Still haven't gotten far enough to marry Chrom, but I was almost there, I swear!! (If you think I care a lot about much else after so many years, you're a fool.)

I don’t have much more to say because a passion for this game has burned within me for years now, and playing it now just matches every expectation of it I used to have. It’s very dear to me, and it’s very good, and that’s good enough.

The actual 2021 list

Rhythm Tengoku (GBA, 2006) [♪ Iai Slash] + Rhythm Heaven Fever (Wii, 2011) [♪ See-Saw]

Rhythm Heaven is a very special, fun and wonderful little series, and I'm happy to say that spending more time with it was the first thing I thought of when I got my new PC.

I played through both Tengoku and Fever this year, but I believe the former is more remarkable because... It's my first time! And the game is honestly a little brutal compared to Fever (thank god for savestates), but it looks somewhat impressive for the GBA, and the music is fabulous, and it's just so exciting to properly see the origins of the best rhythm game series ever. If the ranking system was just a tad less strict, I would have loved to get to know it fully.

However, keep in mind this is the game that has Quiz and an endless game as original as Mr. Upbeat. You can’t have your cake and eat it?..

Anyway, Fever I actually managed to complete without much issues (Working Dough 2 aside. My god, that game can go fuck itself.), which was another longtime dream of mine! Yay!! In my opinion, Fever hits the perfect sweetspot between being so strict you can’t pass a remix and being so forgiving that you don’t feel accomplished unless you get a Perfect (looking at you, Megamix). The games are well-varied as well, although overall they rely too much on holding A+B together… I suppose that is better than motion controls, though!

More about the games themselves: most of them are solid. If you haven’t gleaned this from the first paragraph already, I think See-Saw is actually a classic. My favorite remix has always been the fourth one (kinda obvious if you bother scrolling through the wall of shitposts on my ‘about’ page), and I have a soft spot for all games on that set, too. Love Rap, while not outstanding, actually gave me a lot less trouble than anticipated (following cues out loud helps), and you just can’t have Karate Man beat!

Even some of the more obscure games, like the two-player Pirate Crew (which I played on my own, while emulating two controllers. It’s fun that way, but quite tough!), are well-made and fun! I’m so glad that even… roughly four years later for me, the game managed to deliver.

Trials of Mana / Seiken Densetsu 3 (PC, 2020 / SNES, 1995) [♪ Meridian Child]

Ah yes, the second-to-last good Mana game with a soundtrack that at times outshines Chrono Trigger! (only at times, though.)

Disclaimer: I have only played the remake, and I only did it once (Riesz\Kevin\Angela was my party). However, I watched two playthroughs that covered the other routes, and one of them was of the SNES version of Trials. Yeah, that took a lot of time!..

(Surprisingly enough, that was all past me had left me with. This is where the list in general shows how it ended up unfinished in time! Time to wrestle with my own memories!)

Here's the thing: for the mid-90s, this game is impressive as all hell. And as someone who has considered herself a casual fan of the series for a few years now (Secret being one of the few games I had a good time with on the SNES Classic, and Legend leaving me with a warmth of fondness in my heart), I was unusually, but unsurprisingly, excited to see this allegedly wonderful work come to us in its full splendor. The favorable reviews of the remake when compared against the sheer mediocrity that was their first attempt with Secret didn't help when it came to quelling my hype either.

And then I booted the game and was greeted eagerly with the wonder of a song that is Meridian Child. You bet I looked forward to it!

In the end, though... even the best Mana games just aren't enough to compete with most RPGs of the modern day, or even some contemporary ones. That's not to say I didn't have fun, but you can't deny how basic this game's story, structure and gameplay feel in the 2020s.

I wasn't disappointed with my choice of characters (they made a very cohesive and satisfying team together, based on almost all-out offense), but I did feel like there wasn't much of anything done to make them feel like a well-thought out party narratively. I mean, the team in Secret didn't have that much reason to get together either, but considering how much the game and its fans tout how 'interconnected' the stories are... I think I have a right to feel let down. The gameplay system itself is pretty bare-bones, too - it doesn't feel all that different from the predecessor (I mean, yes, you no longer have to wait to strike at full power, but does that count as an actual change?), and playing it in 3D made me realize how much the charm of the excellent 2D sprites had carried the series all along.

The character designs are... very 90s, for all the good and bad that entails. Angela in particular deserves the small degrees of infamy she got upon the game's release. However, in a complete vacuum, they're quite pleasant (Riesz especially - doubly so in the Star Lancer class she ended up with on my playthrough.), and the way they change together with the classes (the whole idea of a class change in a game that's not strictly about classes like Fire Emblem is great!) is spectacular.

The music is absolutely wonderful, and unlike Secret, the remade versions don't ruin the SFC sound's charm either. Trials was one of the few remakes where I actively made use of the soundtrack version switch! It's still hard to pick a single favorite, even when my excitement about this game has long since quietened. Walls and Steels, Powell, the cheekily-named Secret of Mana (ignore the video title, lol - SE seems to have gotten greedy with copyright strikes in the years since I started this list) and Damn Damn Drum are just a few pieces I have enjoyed for years - both the original and the remade versions.

The logical conclusion here is that in this day and age, this game is nothing more than eye candy, accompanied with Kikuta's finest work. But hey, sometimes that's just what you need, and I enjoyed what it had to offer!

Wandersong (PC, 2018) [♪ Sailing with the Coffee Pirates]

The one thing Wandersong became particularly well-known for is its… energy, in my opinion. On their own, the colorful visuals, charming writing and welcoming music wouldn't amount to nearly as much as they do when they all come together. Fitting for a game whose message is all about the whole world coming together to accomplish what no one could on their own, huh?

This, believe it or not, is the solution to basically every problem - big or small - that plagues the world of Wandersong. Good thing singing is basically all our adorable protagonist* can do! You'll never guess what they end up doing for the world they live in, either!! (save it. they save it.) ...but what matters is that they don't do it alone. (and that they're not the eternally cheerful bundle of energy they always seem to be.)

*I lovingly named them Bong as soon as I saw the opportunity to do so, but I know their actual name is supposed to be Kiwi. I doubt I'll address the character themselves much while writing, but if I do, I'll probably end up calling them the Bard anyway, for simplicity. 'Bong' was funny while it lasted, though!

Call it cheesy, call it overdone - it doesn't change the excellent execution of the ideas brought to the table. Playing this game is like looking back at your younger self who believed in fairytales, and telling them 'no, it's not always like those stories, even if sometimes it seems that it will be. But what you can do is be yourself, and like-minded people will flock to you. And others will have something to learn from your example!'.

Also, you can dab and play Megalovania (if you know how to) in this game. 10/10 meme potential. ...I'm honestly struggling to put my impressions in words - it really is just a warm cup of coffee brewed the right way. It can barely be described any better than a warm way of sunshine. My rambling doesn't do justice to how adorable it was.

Va-11 Hall-A + KIDS! (PC, 2016 + 2018) [♪ Base of the Titans + Her Noise]

Screw it, I don't care what this inclusion says about me. I recognize this has similar pitfalls to the previously shat on Night in the Woods (Jill is barely any better of a protagonist than Mae, only more grounded; the amount of stupid and/or immature jokes is similar, if not worse; the Julianne minigame is super dumb), but listen! I just heard of a visual novel that was inspired by PC-98 graphics and immediately drooled and had to find out more.

The pixel art is indeed immaculate, if not too varied. The music is really good. Might not be something to listen to much outside of the game, but while you play, it ENHANCES the experience ♥ [this is so funny to read to me, considering I Still consider this to be a phenomenal score and have come to enjoy it a ton in 2022, even finding it genuinely inspiring at times. Don't listen to past me, this game is full of bangers.] Not to mention how diverse it can be sometimes — i.e. the track above vs. Snowfall vs. Showtime! [my personal current favorite] That, combined with how you're in charge of what you're hearing most of the time, makes for a very chill experience that manages to reflect what you're feeling impressively well.

The idea of the story changing depending on the drinks you mix is interesting in theory, but the way it plays out in practice is just a lot of basic win/fail branching that doesn't ever seem to change more than a few lines most of the time. The script is actually quite robust when you look deep into it, but it's hard to witness while you actually play. This game could benefit from a flowchart to encourage players to explore. (However, Alma acknowledging you're trying to cheer her up with her favorite drink despite her ordering something entirely different – that's good! I want more of that!)

Other things ruining the drink system are:

the fact that the recipes are easily accessible, so unless Jill gets distracted and/or the order is obscure, it's impossible to screw it up or experiment;

it's all revealed at once, which makes gameplay more repetitive than it had to be;

you need a LOT of money, especially if you're buying as much furniture as I did, which further discourages you from experimenting on your first playthrough

A lot of the jokes are (im)mature, hit or miss, and reliant on recent internet culture. There's too many dogs and they're not even funny, either. This is not going to age well, but the game still made me chuckle reliably, dang it!

The world gets a surprising amount of development thanks to Jill's phone apps and exposure to all manner of clients. It's really a shame you don't get to see any of it aside from her bar and room! And despite what I said earlier, it's hard not to get invested in Jill's struggles to live and make peace with herself.

This is far from a masterpiece, but to me it's clear that it's not what it wanted to be – you can feel the developers striving for more, which is a good thing. It makes for a great time with a chilled beverage of your choice and it looks great, I couldn't ask for more!

KIDS! is a fabulous spinoff that is way too good for an April Fool's joke! The art is inspired and cute, the music is just as good as the original and even better at times, and the decrease in mature jokes is honestly refreshing.

Ys VIII: Lacrimosa of Dana (PC, 2018) [♪ Royal Capital Aigius]

I'm soooo conflicted on this one.

The character/flashbacks artwork is really amazing and I loved it all immediately... but I really can't say the same about the game's actual graphics. They're serviceable, but I wish there were more chances to show off the gorgeous artwork!

Dana might be the best character in the whole series and I fucking love her, but the way she exists in the same game as Sahad is a travesty. Dogi needed to switch places with him and be playable.

Exploring the island is pretty fun for the most part. The way everything's marked on the map makes it rot a little, for sure, but I won't refuse a nice distracting checklist! After all, I play Trails! Unfortunately, the locations don't vary, like, at all (aside from Eternia, which was great), so if you binge this game, you're guaranteed to get sick of greenery and dinosaurs :(

Some of the music is as good as you would expect from an early 10s Falcom game (everything to do with Dana/Eternia, Alone on the Deserted Island, Gens d'Armes, etc). Key word is 'some'. Despite what I just said, I think Iclucian Dance is uh... Flawed. And all music for raids/hunts can die in a fire. In addition, aside from these clearly bad tracks, I have bias against the kind of music Ys uses in general, so in total my OST impression is one big fat 'meh!'.

I like the general idea of abandoned island/castaways, getting them back together and having to figure out what's going on before stumbling onto Dana... Why did this get diluted with thematic clashes ghost pirate ships and silly assassins?

Getting the castaways might be fun, but their actual personalities are unimpressive. I don't want to blow this flaw out of proportion - this is Ys, after all, and it's about as good as I would expect for Ys, but still. The feeling of the whole village bonding is greater than the impressions from its individual residents. Not to mention, it devolved into yet another save the world plot near the end, when I would've preferred something that focused on Dana more than it already did.

Moving on to gameplay... wow, an Ys game that has a party instead of a single playable character works? Kinda. The bare minimum is done to distinguish between characters, and the Flash system trivializes most differences anyway. In the end, only Adol and Dana are actually fun to use. Unless you count spamming the same skill over and over.

Sanctuary Crypt was a very fun optional dungeon with the best boss to boot. Block puzzles soured my impression, though. Meanwhile, most of the other levels are nothing to write home about, if not outright terrible.

And since I have nowhere else to put this: raids/hunts as a whole are unnecessary, grind the slow pace of the game to a halt and are not fun. Also, giving Adol binary and meaningless dialogue options won't make him a nicer character, the outside narrator explaining his thoughts in the older games was better.

Cosmic Star Heroine (PC, 2017) [♪ A Conspiracy]

What do we have here? A very unique battle system that is greatly enjoyable, but really, only in short bursts (a huge part of why I almost burnt out on the game was playing it on Hard / Heroine – made it drag). What makes it stand out is how it elegantly limits your abilities - you can only use each of your equipped moves once, before you have to recharge them by defending. It's a refreshing take, to be sure, but when you play the game for hours on end, it turns into something that feels more like padding than actual mechanic.

There's also a unique soundtrack, which should not really be a surprise, given the composer, but still, you just don't hear stuff like A Firebrand, An Agitator in your everyday RPG! It can feel a little off and cringe-inducing sometimes, but it's honestly just very awesome overall.

The pixel art in this game can be hit or miss, but luckily, it never missed in its most important moments, and character portraits did not fail to please.

That's about where CSH's strengths come to an end, however. When it comes to personalities, everyone is pretty dry and feels like cardboard, but it felt fair to me, since I knew what I was jumping into. And the gorgeous presentation, battle system and decent jokes all outweighed the forgettable plot!!! It was a good time ♥

Pyre (PC, 2017) [♪ Surviving Exile]

Near flawless given what it sets out to do, discounting the slower pacing near the second half. For a pitch as uniquely strange as 'visual novel where you have to play a game of sports-lite about a dozen times', Pyre manages to be incredibly compelling and welcoming to nigh everyone that approaches it, thanks to having what can be graciously called an open-ended story that is, in a way, completely independent from the 'sports'-like parts of the game (you can lose every match and still reach the end), and yet, in a lot of other ways, bound together (hehe) with it so intricately that it might as well count as a gameplay\story integration masterclass. The fates of characters you love riding on your shoulders and the performance you're willing to deliver is a simple, but elegant way to set up the narrative.

And the gameplay itself is... well... it's everything you could want it to be within reason, I guess. On the surface, it's not particularly complicated - you control three characters one at a time to score goals while preventing the AI from doing the same - but the amount of choices given (and supported by the narrative) when it comes to composing your team and letting it grow is surprisingly high. In addition, one of the defining features of Supergiant's games is the freedom they give you when it comes to difficulty, and Pyre is no stranger to this. There's the previously mentioned freely available option to lose, but if that's not enough, Pyre has an always accessible difficulty toggle and the (by this point expected) extra difficulty modifiers.

Of course, one of the biggest reasons Pyre saw success in the first place was its ingenious presentation - it's pretty without being overwhelming with details or feeling pretentious, the character designs stand out on their own while also conveying a much needed feeling of unity... and the soundtrack is one of the best I've heard in a game, period, managing to tie plenty of rather diverse styles, from the gentle vocals used in something like Mourning Song to the appropriately abrupt metal track that is Thrash Pack, together neatly, without clashing or betraying the game's intentions.

And that's without going into how dynamic everything sounds - there's the obvious changes, like the theme song of the Liberation Rites and the (wonderful) ending song changing lyrics depending on who you faced and\or what the outcome was, and the more subtle ones, like Surviving Exile (and most other tracks) having different layers to them that show themselves appropriately, with that track in particular doing a splendid job of both setting the game's overall mood and, well, setting, as well as providing a thematic foundation for three of the game's more important characters.

That's not to say they're given more time than the rest or anything like that - all characters, at least the ones that band together for your cause, are well-written given the short runtime (I always looked forward to talking with the kind and resolute Hedwyn in particular :) ), and even those that face off against you carry just enough intrigue to be interesting and have their own place in this strange little world. Therefore, Pyre excels at selling you the found family narrative, if you're willing to stick to it, not in the least because your role as the Reader in particular is handled so well.

You're basically half of the reason these beings of different walks and ways of life could have banded together instead of resigning themselves to their fate in the first place, they owe a lot to you in that sense, and yet, they make it a point to make sure you stand as an equal among them. They're willing to stand up for you just as much as you are for them, though some might need a little convincing first. It all makes for lovely interactions that enhance the cast and the world around them, while still making your place in it feel unique. Never have I felt so good about being literate, which is a plot point that ends up enhancing the worldbuilding in rather impressive ways - helping you feel closer ties with everything that's happening, since obviously you can read, and making the world around you take shape and feel more real thanks to the Book of Rites. (And of course, the small detail of being able to choose the Reader's pronouns and that change being reflected everywhere, including the music, is just about the cherry on top - I like it because you can use it both to increase immersion and to distance yourself from the narrative as much as you want.)

So yeah! A refreshing experience that never quite falters from start to finish, with a powerful and positive message to deliver... it would have been the game of the year... were I not a Trails fan...

Katana ZERO (PC, 2019) [♪ Katana ZERO]

Yes, I did pick that track to do the 'Fullmetal Alchemist. Fullmetal Alchemist.' thing. But it's also genuinely really good! Although my big faves are Sneaky Driver, Full Confession and Overdose. The soundtrack in general, while hit or miss sometimes, overall has an incredible sound that would resonate very well with younger me, methinks. The heavy reliance on bass and repetition is exactly what I'm here for, and it's a flawless fit for a game that has you spend a lot of time perfecting the execution of each of its challenges – it draws you into the setting and the mood without having an overwhelming presence. I also love the little detail of Zero actually turning it on every level – I admit, it got me pretty pumped across the whole game.

The aesthetic/presentation is top notch, I enjoyed every second of it. Zero's movement looks and feels very fluid, the overall color scheme is just my absolute favorite, and the way it all reminded me somewhat of the glory days of vaporwave was great too. Not to mention that in general, 2D art in games is my jam... I was SOLD!

The gameplay is far from my comfort zone, but I ended up enjoying it more than expected (it almost gave me the worst case of hand cramps I've ever had, that's how addictive it is, lmao). It's a huge shame that I can't think of any other similar games off the top of my head that I would truly get interested in, without having to wrestle with heavy-themed plots or anything similar (because let's face it, this was one of the few games where I didn't bother with engaging with the story. I was here for the spectacle, and boy, on that level it delivered.).

I loved the general cycle of 'start the level, die immediately, start actually plotting a strategy, die as soon as that strat fails you, develop a fully functional plan, spend some more time executing it... wait, I did it! And didn't realize I was holding my breath the whole time! PHEW, time to watch the tape!'. The last level in particular had me feeling like I was pulling off pure miracles just with my guts and reaction, and it's a fantastic feeling! ...and then I watched the speedruns of the game, which show perfectly how tight the execution in this game has to be, and lost my mind, it's crazy.

The dialogue system in KZ, while undercooked, is intriguing nonetheless, and some of the optional dialogue can be pretty funny. (Pinkachu, anyone?) In addition, I found it ridiculously hilarious to see СУКАБЛЯТЬ multiple times across this otherwise clearly-not-supposed-to-be-russian-at-all game.

And, despite just saying that I did not care for the overarching story, I have to admit, I was drawn in by the sheer mysterious, yet human-like, presence of Zero as the protagonist. This is a game that's not afraid to be itself, and, for better or worse, it had all the right elements to undeniably suck me in. Playing it even a year later is a feeling so specific and good that I'm stuck yearning for more of it. Maybe one day it'll come in the form of DLC?

OneShot (PC, 2016) [♪ On Little Cat Feet]

This game genuinely was a touching little experience (and you know me, I love me some toying with the fourth wall), complete with adorable pixel art and one of the sweetest protagonists known to RPGs. I know usually people tend to rave about this game (and rightfully so, most of the hubbub is deserved), but personally I'm like 'yeah! I played it! It was fantastic!', and I don't really want to preach to the choir beyond that. I do want to point out that this will probably remain one of my favorite 'meta' gaming experiences, though - this game does not try too hard to appeal to the player (and therefore, it never feels like the narrative is falling flat on its face), and the simple story hook of a lost child like Niko trying to find their way with your help is lovely and effective at keeping you invested. It's just... nice, okay? Sometimes it's enough for a game to be nice.

The Legend of Heroes: Trails to Azure (PC, 2011, tr. 2021) [♪ Heavenly Chariot]

There are a couple of points to make about this game:

1. The music in Azure is beyond incredible, and showing off but a single track would be an unforgivable crime. At the same time, it's very easy to just point to the entire damn OST as an example of RPG music excellency. I guess they were not kidding when they said Falcom peaked music-wise right around the time this game came out!! When I talked about Zero, I mentioned that, despite how much I liked that soundtrack, I felt like it lacked consistency to a certain degree, which had hurt it, in my opinion. Azure, looking back, managed to strike the balance between having distinct memorable tracks and staying cohesive as a game soundtrack, which is what, deep down, I was looking for in Zero the year before. I remember laughing to myself about how different my opinions on Trails music tend to be from what seems to be the norm established in the fandom, but playing through Azure was the first time I found myself agreeing with 'the masses'. It's impossible not to adore this soundtrack.

2. The main reason this will never be the greatest of Trails to me is that I believe Azure marks the point in the series where the time put into the game (as a completionist who fishes for everything each Kiseki has to offer) starts to become disproportionate to what you actually get out of it.

To explain: while the main storyline is as well-written and exciting (though in a different way from Sky or even Zero - this game is famous for pulling out all the stops, and starting with a bang while finishing with a series of even bigger bangs) as always, this very likely came at the cost of the usually outstanding dialogue of the NPCs. Each time you go on your routine laps around the region, in any way you can, 90% of the time you will only see characters say one-liners about the current situation. That you just witnessed during the main quest from the perfect viewpoint. With your own eyes. It gets, uh... annoying?

And in addition to that, Azure is crazy about locking DP behind random things. Some of them are easy to figure out, naturally, but you will not be reaching first (or even second) rank without guides. And the biggest reason for this is the combination of ridiculously well-hidden quests and unwinnable battles that give you 5 DP in exchange for burning out on your item stash!! >:( You can be smug about this point, given that this is part of what the whole series is known for, but attaining max DP rank here is definitely more of a challenge than even in its prequel.

If that wasn't enough, there are eleven characters Lloyd can get bonding events with, drastically up from Zero's three for like no reason? Which is clearly designed to entice you into doing multiple playthroughs of a 100+ hours long game! I am not against getting more of beloved protagonists, but this is a very bad way to go about it. [laughs in CS1]

The gameplay here is also something I came to appreciate more a year later, after getting to know CS1. As the saying goes, you don't know what you have till it's gone, and this applies perfectly to the changes made to the battle system, particularly Orbments, over the years. When I played Azure, I didn't think too favorably of the addition of Master Quartz, but it ultimately made for an excellent fit, further emphasizing the combat roles the characters are made to fill while giving you an improved sense of progression with the MQ being able to level up.

All this, combined with the fact that I had been stubborn enough to use Hard instead of Normal (lose-lose deal – on Normal regular encounters wouldn't be as fun, on Hard I get my ass kicked by ultra-strong bosses harder. Retry Offset, I miss you...)... Yeah, that is why I almost broke the game with debug mode during the finale (that boss fight was over-reliant on Burst, I swear), and I have no regrets :p

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate (Switch, 2018) [♪ Main Theme ~ Piano]

This GIF is actually an accurate summary of how my time with this game went.

I feel like, despite past me claiming that Azure was rightfully the spotlight of her year, the true game of 2021 was this all along. Partially because '21 was the only year when I could enjoy it to the fullest. I don't really want to talk about it much, which is funny when I try to look back at the huge rant I had half-prepared about my love-hate relationship with this game (bring back shielddropping! and good singleplayer! and give us good online!), rife with comparisons to Smash 4 and small things only true nerds semi-competitive players care about, but now it all just reminds me of the Smash Ball-shaped hole I have in my soul.

Maybe in another world, I'll be able to enjoy Smash again. For now, I have to thank Ultimate for making 2021 feel like something I earned. For the greatest soundtrack a game ever could have. And of course, for the Palutena buffs. I still remember when I thought she would never appear again, much less be empowered like she was. 💚

In conclusion, this is a game that can be painful to love, but love persists nonetheless, because there is nothing like Smash Ultimate in the world. ❤ - 2021 me, who was right

#yearly game list #long post #flashing gif #zero.txt #hades #ddlc #ys #ib #ssb #aa #fea #rh #tom #mtag #ws #csh #pyre #kz #os #trails #see you in like a month with another bucket list #because this time there hopefully won't be a dumb delay #i had such a huge rant about the minutiae of ultimate in there somewhere but now i don't have the heart to deal with it

[trashquisitor-shirozora]

for the deep fic writer asks: 2, 10, 16 & 19

2. what’s a fic that took you to an emotional/dark/hard place?

Oh god. I'm gonna have to go back quite a few years but I wrote two fics that I have a hard time revisiting. I really need to edit one, though, because I made a creative decision that didn't work.

A Deafening Distance is a Supernatural fic where Dean said yes to Michael, and Sam and Cas are left to pick up the pieces. There is a mini cast of OCs and I thought it would be funny to name the OCs after the actors but some people found it disorienting. I keep meaning to change that but I haven't been able to visit this fic and I posted it in 2010.

Wishing Well was a Cap Kink Meme fill back when kink memes were a huge thing on LJ. It's a CATFA fic and the prompt was "kissing lessons" and it's from Howard Stark's POV and I kept the ending the same as the movie so it was... it's really sad? But it's a good kind of sad, if that makes sense.

P.S. The ficmix I made for this fic still wrecks me.

10. how has writing positively impacted your mental health or overall mood?

All I can say is, if I can't write I'll go fucking mad. My brain is always on its bullshit. I maybe spent late elementary through early middle school obsessing over 1 ginormous crossover fic that I wrote in my head; it had its own soundtrack and score and the character voices I swear were on point and it was all I could think about. I still remember it all these years later because I never wrote it down. It seared itself in my head. Being able to write is like venting a pressure cooker and keeps me sane and focused.

16. Do you re-read old fics? Is there a time in your writing you won’t go back to?

I will not touch anything I wrote and posted to FFN. I refuse. But I'll re-read old fics I posted to AO3. I spent hours tracking down all my old Transformers fics in my old external HDDs to read and feel sad over the stories I wanted to tell but couldn't. I'll revisit the massive Tronfic that imo changed my life forever and is still my personal standard that I am always reaching for with my newer fics. I'll also click the back button on some of my fics because those stories just don't cut it for me anymore. It's nice to look back on your older work to see what held up, what didn't, what trends you kept, and how much you changed since you posted those fics.

19. If you could write an ideal fic, what would it include?

My ideal fic would have a deliciously slow burn romance against a plotty backdrop steeped in political conflicts and sociopolitical change/revolution. I think that's one of the reasons why I'm still going so hard and heavy for dinluke; I get so insane just thinking about the parallels between Din and Luke and their respective cultures/heritages, the play on "enemies to lovers" but on a generational scale where Din heard stories, where Mandalorian armor and weapons are designed to fight the Jedi, and Luke? Knows not enough because he has nothing but the teachings of two Jedi ghosts, whatever he can scavenge and salvage of the Jedi Order, stories from people who still remember the Jedi. Din is of an endangered people and Luke is of a nearly extinct people, and while Din tripped and fell into being the wielder of the Darksaber, Luke chose to try to reclaim and rebuild the Order. And they only crossed paths because Din sacrificed his covert for a Jedi youngling and went through hell to reunite Grogu with his kind. It's insane. They're insane. They drive me insane.

I am also so endlessly fascinated by this post-war galaxy, the rippling consequences of the Empire's downfall, the generational conflict between people who grew up while the Empire was in power vs. people who remembered the last years of the Galactic Republic, the struggles of a New Republic building on the ashes of the Empire and memories of the Galatic Republic, all the cartels and crime syndicates/organizations rushing in to get theirs, the displaced peoples either trying to come home or make a place for themselves in a turbulent galaxy, etc, etc, etc.

Uh. Yeah. I'm that kind of fic writer/fandom person.

Fuck that was a really long answer, oops.

Play ask games, win ask prizes.

#shirozora awkwardly responds to asks #can i tag this dinluke #i'm gonna tag this #dinluke #because I will ramble forever and a half about why this ship just clicks for me #especially against this post-war backdrop like #i go fucking feral just thinking about it #which is why I'm writing a fucking trilogy working out my feels about all of this #keep it small by watching the galaxy from din's headspace but allow a glimpse into the greater galaxy's struggles #i fucking love this shit #this is why i fucking love Andor. that show just fucking does it for me #the way the first two seasons of The Mandalorian did it for me #sorry to TBOBF and Kenobi #Kenobi was fine but didn't do enough #meanwhile I have so much beef with TBOBF it almost rivals my fucking seething hatred for TLJ #ANYWAY #the other fics i mentioned exist on AO3 though I really need to sit down and edit that SPN fic #it really deserves a second pass