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whomst-art-thou-whomst-whomst · 3 years

Text

Texts from the Lost Tomb part 6.1

🎶 Back on the bullshit I never got off🎶

Is this another unnecessary story arc?? With three sections??

Yes.

Wushanju Crew Chat

Wang Meng: You know, I’m someone who appreciates consistency in my day. My life is pleasant, very few issues indeed if you ignore the big ones. And yet. Yet here we are. With unresolved messes at the end of a day.

Wang Pangzi: SOMETHIN YOU NEED TO SAY MARY POPPINS

Wang Meng: We need to talk about Huo Daofu and the glittery bead curtain.

Wang Pangzi: MY FAVE TEEN WIZARD SERIES

Wu Xie: did you turn on that suggested word thingy lol

What glittery bead curtain

Wang Meng: I closed the shop at 6:00pm this evening on the dot. I locked all of the doors in and out of the shop very carefully, especially in light of recent events. The hall leading to the back office was empty. I filed the day’s paperwork, updated and sent emails, and then spent an extra hour organizing receipts and dusting. When I came back out, there were glittery iridescent bead curtains over the front entrance to the shop.

What could this mean?

Wu Xie: uh that you need to spend less time at work?

Wang Pangzi: LOOKS LIKE WE GOT ONE FOR THE DETECTIVES. THE MYSTERY OF THE BEDAZZLED THRESHOLD COMMENCES

Wu Xie: I think we can be relatively secure in thinking a glittery bead curtain isn’t a hostile threat

Wang Pangzi: SAYS YOU

I REMEMBER YE OLDE EXPLORATION TIMES HOW FAST THINGS GOT FURIOUS

BEANBAG CHAIRS SET AFLAME AND LEFT ON DOORSTEPS AS A WARNING

GLITTERBOMBS FOR DAYS

PANIC AT THE DISCO

Wang Meng: Ugh, forget it. I should have just taken them down, regardless of who they belong to.

Zhang Qiling: They are not mine.

Wang Pangzi: A BOLD STATEMENT COMING FROM OUR PRIME SUSPECT

SOMEONE QUICK GO DRAW CHALK AROUND THE DOORWAY TO MARK THE SCENE OF THE CRIME

Wang Meng: Do we know anyone who *would* sneak in and put those up? For whatever reason, legal or not? Even as a joke?

Wang Pangzi: ARE YOU SERIOUSLY ASKING WHETHER WE KNOW ANYONE WHO IS CHAOTIC, AN OUTLAW, A PRANKSTER AND/OR SNEAKS INTO PLACES

BECAUSE THAT WOULD MEAN OUR SUSPECT LIST IS LITERALLY EVERYONE WE KNOW EXCEPT FOR YOU.

Wu Xie: okay let’s think about this; for starters, I didn’t break into my own shop

Wang Meng: You would be in danger of doing some work in the process, that’s true.

Wang Pangzi: LOL

Wu Xie: ANYWAY let’s keep going. For example, Xiao Ge would only break in somewhere for a good reason. Xiao Ge, did you do this?

Zhang Qiling: No.

Wu Xie: okay who’s next

Wang Pangzi: YOU REALLY MISSED YOUR CALLING IN INTERROGATION TIANZHEN

REALLY PUT THE SCREWS TO HIM

IN MORE WAYS THAN ONE;)

Zhang Qiling: How can we be certain *you* didn’t do it?

Wang Meng: Admittedly that was my guess, too.

Wang Pangzi: WOW I SEE HOW IT IS

BLAME PANGZI AS USUAL

ANYWAY HOW DOES HUO DAOFU FIT INTO THIS

Wu Xie: Oh yeah him! Oops I got distracted

Wang Pangzi: UR ENTIRE HISTORY IN A NUTSHELL

Wu Xie: Ugh fuck off

Wang Meng what abt Huo Daofu??

Zhang Qiling: ?

Wu Xie: oh sorry xiaoge I didn’t realize you wouldn’t have spent much time around him last year

He and I go way back

Zhang Qiling: Way back where?

Babysitters Club Chat

Wang Pangzi: I CANNOT BELIEVE HE IS BUYING YOUR INNOCENT ACT

IF YOU EVER TURN TO EVIL WE ARE FUCKED

Zhang Qiling: ?

Wang Pangzi: YOU KNOW EXACTLY WHO HUO DAOFU IS

YOU WERE EXTREMELY POLITE AND BORDERLINE FRIENDLY TOWARDS HIM

Zhang Qiling: I wanted him to feel welcome. I wanted to be sure he understands he has a place here. A specific place.

Wang Pangzi: FOR A SILENT GUY YOU ARE A MASTER AT SUBTLE POWER PLAYS IM ALL TINGLY

LMAO THE IDEA OF WU XIE LEAVING YOU FOR HUO DAOFU IS HILARIOUS AND ALSO NOPE

Zhang Qiling: Rationally, I understand that.

Main Chat

Wang Meng: Huo Daofu is coming for the weekend—didn’t Wu Xie tell you? Wu Xie asked me to check in a week ahead so we could start getting ready for his arrival

Wu Xie: oh yeah I did do that

Wang Meng: Fortunately I know you and so I already went ahead and took care of everything.

Re: the trip

He made a deal with Wu Xie’s doctor that he would do periodic checkups on him here at Wushanju

Bc Wu Xie hates being in the hospital

And frankly the hospital hates him too

Wang Pangzi: FAMILIARITY BREEDS CONTEMPT LOL

I FORGOT HUO DAOFU WAS DOING THAT

A VERY CHIVALROUS GESTURE

WOULDNT YOU SAY

XIOAGE

Zhang Qiling: Is it safe for him to be here with a criminal loose on the premises?

Wu Xie: Right, back to the curtain! Let’s focus on the curtain, hmm?

Wang Pangzi: I AM SO LOOKING FORWARD TO THIS WEEKEND.

ALSO WE CAN RULE OUT XIAO BAI FOR THE CURTAIN SHE JUST SENT A SELFIE FROM NORWAY COVERED IN GREEN SLIME WITH ZERO CONTEXT, UR PROTEGE INDEED

Wu Xie: okay but who else would do something so oddly charming yet illegal and—wait.

Snake Eyes Chat

Wu Xie: hey, Glasses hasn’t been in touch lately right?

Li Cu: uh nope

Unless u count the outdated memes

Why, is money or Xie Yuchen missing

Or is this curtain related, I saw Wang Meng’s tweet

Wu Xie: haha no nothing to worry about really

(I mean maybe? but who knows)

Wang Meng is probably just getting a little paranoid in his old age

Li Cu: better than getting reckless and stupid as hell in ur old age

Wu Xie: …hey:(

Unknown Number: Li Cu, we discussed this.

Wu Xie: ????????

Li Cu: *sigh* fine, reckless and stupid as heck

Unknown Number: …close enough.

Wu Xie: EXCUSE who is that

Madame, Sir, Non-Binary Tree Spirit, etc—whomst the fuck

Are you

Li Cu is underage FYI

So Im staying on this chat

Li Cu: okay first of all, it’s not like that

Second of all I’m literally not underage I s2g

u threw the embarrassing surprise bday party, okay so u should remember

And C, that’s my counselor and I invited her. She wanted to meet u and I knew u wouldn’t agree to a visit so I added her to our chat

we have been discussing u

Wu Xie: Oh wow!!!!!!!

What a surprise:)

hi so nice to meet you:)

Main Chat:

Wu Xie: RED FUCKING ALERT

FUCK THE CURTAIN FUCK THE VISIT

IVE BEEN TRICKED INTO FAMILY THERAPY BY A SMUG TEENAGER WHO TEXTS UNKNOWN NUMBERS

Wang Meng: I assume that means something to someone here?

Not my problem? Good.

Wang Pangzi: AHAHAHA GOD I LOVE LI CU

HES LIKE ADORABLE KARMA FOR ALL THE SHIT YOUVE PUT ME THROUGH

IM RAISING HIS ALLOWANCE

Wu Xie: wait i give him an allowance

has he been collecting on two allowances??

Zhang Qiling: Three. I knew about both of yours.

Snake Eyes Chat

Wu Xie: so uh may I ask your name?

Unknown Number: you can call me Ms. Lee.

Now, if you’re comfortable talking in this format, why don’t you tell me how things have been going?

Wu Xie: oh everything is normal and fine and safe as usual, why do you ask:)

Li Cu: I heard about ur necklace thing. nice of you to NOT mention it.

another dangerous adventure. again. prick.

Ur lucky your cool boyfriend cares about you so much or you’d have already died like ten years ago

Wu Xie: lol try twenty years ago

Li Cu: That isn’t funny.

Unknown Number: …What?

Wu Xie: shit ur right, okay that was a bit glib, my apologies.

…I use humor as a coping mechanism?

Unknown Number: and Li Cu, how do you feel about that?

Li Cu: he doesn’t even know what that phrase means

He doesn’t cope, like ever

In fact

It’s kind of why we met

Which is a funny story in retrospect tbh

Wu Xie: haha what are you talking about sweetie hahaha need I remind you of certain anecdotes that could idk send me to jail maybe lmao

Unknown Number: …You know, perhaps an in-person meeting might be more effective?

Wu Xie: haha such a nice idea but why

Main Chat

Wu Xie: If I go to jail, I’ll have to create alliances for protection, right, that’s how it works on tv

Who do we know who spends time in jail

Other than Hei Yangjing, he’s only ever there for like 12 hours and i suspect he just gets himself arrested bc he enjoys the breaking out process

Also how’s the curtain case coming along

Zhang Qiling: Has someone threatened you?

Wu Xie: well not yet but soon I’m sure

Wang Pangzi: WHERE WAS THIS PARANOIA WHEN WE GOT TAKEN TO THE TEA HOUSE HUH

Snake Eyes Minus Your Fucking Therapist Chat

Li Cu: okay how tf did u pull off spy and undercover shit

u are sus as hell

Wu Xie: damn son is it pick on Wu Xie night

I missed the flyers or I would’ve invited my uncles

Also re: the curtain it’s been mostly solved

Li Cu: I’m not your son, idiot.

Wu Xie: …oh. Sorry, sorry, you’re right, bad choice of words, haha

Forget i said anything

Delete this chat even

Li Cu: shit I meant

Legally, biologically, I meant—

shit

…I turn into an asshole as a coping mechanism?

Wu Xie: oh that’s all okay! I have to go do something else now let me know if you need anything okay kid thanks!

Li Cu: goddamn it calm down who’s the kid here

lemme organize my thoughts so I can articulate my emotions fuckin healthily or w/e

Ugh maybe for like one afternoon we could go to Ms. Lee together? She knows how to word stuff

Wu Xie: uh…okay.

Li Cu: Anyway you don’t need to worry abt jail

As if you would survive prison for one day you’d piss off half the place in like an hour or less

I gave Ms. Lee the heavily edited version of the desert highway to hell roadtrip and i discussed it more in terms of like “nightmarish but still wouldn’t take any of it back”

Well maybe the sand

that shit was everywhere

Wu Xie: oh kiddo. It’s fine, really…You don’t have to explain yourself to me.

Li Cu: no, no it’s just

I do technically have a dad

who is an asshole. Being a son doesn’t really mean shit to me bc it sucked.

So you need to stop backing down just cuz ur guilty abt stuff. I’m really really glad ur not my dad in a good way. Do u get what I mean there

Where’s the mafia widower I followed into hell, huh

Wu Xie: Ur a good kid, despite my influence. I’m really glad you have someone to talk to after everything I…after everything. Wow this talking through feelings thing is kind of weird but nice ur right

Jfc no wonder it took me and xiaoge so long to—you know what, we won’t get into that

Li Cu: ew tmi

Also re: this week’s recent necklace fuckery

I moved my stuff here, I live here now

So you can’t die anymore

Or else…Idk I don’t have a threat planned

anyways abt the curtain

Wu Xie: oh my god, kid…kid you have no idea

I am in tears.

Li Cu: see this is why I can’t be nice to you I can sense the hallmark channel from here

Ugh don’t be sad in ur room that’s dumb

Go hug Pangzi or something

Maybe delete this chat

Or the curtain thing

Focus on the curtain thing

Just stfu and go away

Wu Xie: <3 screenshotting this <3

Li Cu: I take back everything I said. This is why Xiao Ge sleeps on the roof. I hope the ghosts of the Wangs put up that curtain to strangle you somehow. Go die in a stupid way, it’ll suit you.

Wu Xie: lol don’t worry I’m not gonna embarrass you with it or anything

Main Chat

Wu Xie: omg guys look how cute my kid is *sending screenshot*

Wang Pangzi: I MEAN

HE IS WISHING YOU DEATH

BUT SURE

CUTE I GUESS

Wu Xie: no but read the whole thing:):):)

Zhang Qiling: It is indeed very hard to remain angry with you. And you are welcome to join me on the roof.

Wang Pangzi: UH NOPE

NOT WHENI HAD TO BLEACH THE COUNTER IN THE KITCHEN

DONT TRAUMATIZE THE EARLY BIRDS THEYRE ALREADY FREAKED OUT BY U YA HOODIE CRYPTID

Wu Xie: ok true but babe ur like a sexy cryptid

Wang Meng: so, are we just accepting that there is a glittery curtain of unknown origin, and Huo Daofu is going to have to see it while he’s waiting for you at Wushanju bc you’re going to family therapy?

Wu Xie: right

Wang Pangzi: SHOULDA TAKEN EARLY RETIREMENT HUH

Wang Meng: I’m going to go dust something.

Unnamed Chat:

Unknown number: so the curtain…

Unknown number 2: yep, not my best work but I kinda panicked last minute u know

Unknown number: what is in the water at Wushanju that makes everyone dumb and attractive

Unknown number 2: relax they’ll figure it out

#ultimate note #whomst #wu xie #dmbj #the lost tomb #pingxie #iron triangle

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hanfugallery · 3 years

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笠帽limao, a general term for a type of Chinese hanfu hat, characterized by a wide brim. The primary form had already appeared during the Shang and Zhou dynasties( 1600 B.C.-256B.C.), and its invention was naturally related to shading from the sun and rain, with a large brim that could both block the rain and shade the sun. In ancient China, limao笠帽 were made of many materials, including bamboo baskets, pouches, ramie, yarn etc. The shape of limao笠帽 is with usually large brim, round, square or pointed tops. The later it was developed, the more it resembled today's hats. In the Ming Dynasty this hat was called a damao大帽, yet it's been around before Ming, inherited from the Song Dynasty and earlier dynasties.

The picture below shows two limao unearthed from the tomb of the Yuan Dynasty minister Wang Shixian汪世显.

Then let's take a look at what the limao笠帽 looked like worn by Ming Dynasty soldiers.

What about the damao大帽 worn by non-military officials and civilians in Ming dynasty?

So how did the term of damao in Ming dynasty come about? The origin of damao is recorded in an ancient book of the Ming Dynasty, san cai tu hui《三才图会》(1607). This book is an encyclopedic book written by 王圻Wang Qi and his song 王思义Wang Siyi, who were literature scholars and book collectors during the Ming Dynasty. Here is the quote 《三才图会》:“大帽，尝见稗官云:国初高皇幸学，见诸生班烈日中，因赐遮荫帽，此其制也，今起家科贡者用之。” Generally when Zhu Yuanzhang, the first emperor of the Ming Dynasty, saw the students taking the imperial examinations sweating in the scorching sun, he gave them damao to protect them from the sun.

The image below is a painting from the Tang dynasty, showing that the basic shape of the damao differs little from that of the Tang dynasty.

The 平番得胜图ping fan de sheng tu is currently housed in the National Museum of China and is considered to be an accurate portrayal of the Ming dynasty's army and is of high reference value.

The above is the consistent history of limao笠帽 in Chinese hanfu. limao was a very common hat in all Chinese dynasties, worn by all classes. The basic shape with a high top made of black gauze and a knotted cord appeared early on. Of course, hats with brims is a common thing for every culture and are found in all parts of the world, just as Eastern and Western civilizations coincidentally documented the prehistoric Flood.

For those interested in more specialized and complete information, here is a ten-minute video detailing the history of limao.

To summarize, limao was first seen in the Han Dynasty terracotta figurines, called li笠, and documented in writings in the ancient book 急就篇(48b.c.-33b.c.), but the brim was not as big as it is now, in the Northern Dynasty(386-581), limao was inspired by the Xianbei people whose ancestors were nomads in ancient Siberia, so the brim was widened, and the top of the hat was added (recorded in the Northern Dynasty mural) and is almost the same as now, after the consistent development recorded but not limited to the Tang Dynasty terracotta figurines and Song Dynasty paintings, especially that Fanyangli influenced the limao style of the Yuan dynasty, and then the Yuan emperor Kublai Khan added curtains behind the limao, and beads and feathers according to the Mongolian custom, and then Ming emperors removed the curtains in the early Ming dynasty, forming a variety of styles.

Facts about damao in Ming dynasty

1. damao was influenced by limao of all the previous dynasties, and arose spontaneously. ✔️

2. damao usually have round top, but there were also other forms of top, such as the quadrilateral.✔️

2. In the early Ming dynasty, influenced by the Mongolian style of the Yuan dynasty (Mongolia added the beads according to its own nomadic style), damao used the gems or beads as a string. ✔️

3. In the middle of the fifteenth century, Emperor Yingzong abolished the bead-string, stipulating that the damao could only be worn with plain string. ✔️

4. The adornment of damao was mainly on the top, with jewels, feathers, and red tassels.✔️

5. From ancient paintings, the decorative method of inserting feathers on one or both sides of the hat, is found in the Ming Dynasty and previous dynasties.✔️

6. damao usually matches with wangjin网巾, a kind of mesh scarf tied back the bangs neatly. ✔️

Now high-priced hanfu stores are making the damao exactly according to the Ming Dynasty style, and are considered historically accurate. However, some middle or low priced hanfu store are lazy and don't make it accurately, so the details are confused with another country' traditional hats with brim, or even worse. A few days ago a famous chinese artist accidentally used the picture of damao of that lazy store as reference to draw her super popular characters and post it on twitter, it could be controversial and offensive to some people from another culture who are not familiar with hanfu and lead to misunderstanding. And then she experienced cyberbullying which is really bad. (btw she also provides the correct ancient Ming portrait as a reference though

I have cautiously observed, and must state that the damao she drew does not show a very clear feature that significantly different from the Ming dynasty damao of a traditional hat from another culture, and I think one reference picture of damao from taobao store does have a slight problem and is ambiguous. Incidentally, the non-damao hat that worn by the other character has also attracted criticism is no problem and actually called yishanguan翼善冠, one of the traditional types of hats for Chinese hanfu, which I will describe later.

Well, you get the idea.

In a more general sense, was the ancient Chinese costume culture, while retaining its original form, influenced by xiyu culture (a general reference to non-Chinese countries on the Silk Road, the ancient cultures of Western and Central Asia and the ancient states, xiyu西域 literally meaning western region) and nomadic cultures such as xianbei culture? Yes, especially in the Tang Dynasty. For example, yuanlingpao圆领袍/rongfu戎服. Did ancient China radiate its costume culture to its neighbors(not all of them), leaving behind similar or even convergent forms, while at the same time they developing their own local characteristics? Yes. If a culture had close contact with China in ancient times, but is geographically separated from China by a long distance or even by the sea, the later its identity will become stronger, and what used to look like Chinese clothing will become less obvious, such as the kimono.

Here are examples of the basically accurate damao in style of ming dynasty by hanfu store. It does not contain all the types.

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spockandawe · 3 years

Note

Hi....If you don't mind me asking, who are your favorite MXTX characters (top 5 from each novel)? And why? I'm sorry if you've answered this question before.

It��s absolutely no problem at all!! I don’t think I’ve been asked this before, but hey, I also have zero object permanence, so it keeps things fresh and new. And it’s interesting to see how my answers change over time! Lemme see, I think I’m going to go in reverse order, because I feel like then I’ll be doing the worst agonizing up front.

TGCF

Fifth favorite: YIN. YU. I know that he’s a minor character and him even making it onto the list is pretty solid performance, but I do feel guilty that he isn’t higher than this. He came out of nowhere in my first reading and punched me in the stomach with emotions. I find his sections so hard to read, and I was DEVASTATED when he died and BEYOND stoked to find out he was still alive in the extras. His story hurts so much! I am weak against characters who have relatively modest goals and still see them snatched away (see also: my next entry) and have to struggle on. I wish wish wish I had a way to see more of how he made his peace with things after being thrown out of heaven, and the nature of the (distant) relationship with Hua Cheng and what happens with Quan Yizhen now that he died in his arms, and still came back anyways, my god!

Fourth favorite: He Xuannnnnn. I have a hard time articulating particulars, but. I love him a lot. I love a character with a grudge, with a deep, painful grudge, where the grudge is hurting him almost as much as it’s hurting the people around him, and setting the grudge aside would also hurt, and then what has any of this been for-- I've used this metaphor for other characters, but I don’t care if I’m overusing it, because I love it. He feels like a character caught in a thorn bush, where simply being there... hurts, but trying to escape or move in any ways is going to hurt worse, and there’s no path forward that doesn’t involve pain. And like... I don’t love the way he hurt Shi Qingxuan (who didn’t quite make this list adfasgdafsd I’M SORRY) but I wouldn’t have liked to see him swallow back down all that pain and set aside everything that happened to his family and fiancee either! I’m always, always soft for characters who have no good path forward and who grit their teeth and set out anyways.

Third favorite: MU QING!!!!!!!!!! I have done... extensive screaming about him. And I love him veryvery much. I can already tell that this list is going to have a lot of mean boys on it, and like... no regrets. Especially since this is one of my FAVORITE flavors, an unapologetic mean boy who is rarely (but sometimes!) soft for the people around him, and who regularly tries to do decently by people, but who consistently gets shat upon and misunderstood and accused of acting in bad faith. I screamed when he and Xie Lian finally got to talk their friendship out in the book. I also screamed when I realized how immediately after Xie Lian’s return he started looking out for him again, and how sincerely, despite his horrible attitude about it. I still want to write more fic for him so badly. I love him so much.

Second favorite: Xie Lian! What a good boy! The best boy! He’s so sweet and gentle, but also the best fightboy this world has ever seen, and also so gently snarky with the people he loves! I just... really love me some traumatized characters who have trouble recognizing that they can be Loved, and I’m not going to write this whole essay right now, but I think in some ways, he’s the most... passive about his romance, out of all the leads? Shen Qingqiu is aggressively oblivious, but Xie Lian kind of gently shrugs off the idea that he might be Hua Cheng’s special someone, until he finally gets hit with the cluestick. I generally shy away from the idea of a character “earning” love, but he’s maybe the mxtx character who moves me most with ‘you deserve to be loved’

Most favorite: Hua Cheng. HUA CHENG. Oh my god, gotta love this boy. Gotta love this devotion. I love a mean boy who is soft for one person, and he EMBODIES it. I mean, I love Shen Jiu, but he barely manages to do the soft thing at all, while Hua Cheng is over here like ‘if I could only be the stone beneath your feet--’ It’s hard to talk about him separately from Xie Lian, because they’re a unit in my head more than just about any other characters on this list are. I don’t want to get this list to get out of control, so I’m not going to scream for too long, but... I could just watch him go forever. I want to write him forever, and that’s a huge aspect of what draws me to some characters.

MDZS

Oh god, I think I lied, I think this book is going to be hardest. Making these choices is AGONIZING.

Fifth favorite: .....Lan Wangji. Oh god, I feel bad about how low he is. But this story is just packed SO full of wonderful characters, and I’m already consumed with guilt over all the characters who aren’t going to make it. I don’t love them less! But my love for characters in this particular story is very evenly distributed. And I think that Wang Yibo’s acting is possibly scoring points with me that the book might not have earned all by itself. Microexpressions and subtle body language add SO MUCH to a character with such flat affect, and I would be drawn to such a closed-off character anyways, but it really helps. And I love, like... the combined subtlety and intensity of his relationships. It’s not that subtle once you know what to look for, and the brother/sworn brother network makes for varying degrees of how much other characters understand of the things he chooses not to explicitly express, and it gives a really interesting character to the way he interacts with the people around him. Also, love me a man with intense separation anxiety.

Fourth favorite: Jiang Yanli? I think it has to be Jiang Yanli, but these rankings are hard. So. I just talked about how much I enjoy the flat affect and closed off nature of Lan Wangji? Well, guess what, I also love it when m’girl is just very GENUINELY AND OPENLY an absolute sweetheart of a person, and I love the contrast between her genuinely kind nature and the uncomfortable pressure that her family’s dynamics put on her to start parenting at a very young age. It’s not necessarily a happy situation, but she adores her brothers so much and they adore her so much! And it’s... a very understated element of the story, but after her parents died, her baby brothers went off to war, and one wreaked havoc as a straightforward commander and one of them disappeared for months and returned as a creepy-ass zombie puppeteer. And she STILL dotes on them like before, despite knowing what they’re capable of. Like, yes, Wei Wuxian just raised an army of corpses and forced a man to eat himself, but I shall still boop him on the nose and feed him Soup. How can I not adore energy like that?

Third favorite: Wei Wuxian, I think. I do adore him a lot. He gives me some of the same vibes that make me ache most with Xie Lian, where he is trying his best, and is struggling to hold on in the face of lots of suffering, and I find it really interesting that when the suffering peaked, Xie Lian was forced go on because he couldn’t die, while Wei Wuxian... expired. That line about ‘he thought that no matter how large the world was, there was still no place for him’ always sticks with me, and hurts me deeply. Xie Lian had most of his personal attachments stripped away, and was left to wander on his own, while Wei Wuxian still had a number of strong connections left, but abruptly exited life. And that informs their respective trauma so interestingly! The way Wei Wuxian bounces between high energy chaos and drained exhaustion is really fascinating to me, and was the thread that held me attached to the book through a very confusing beginning. And I’m still very drawn to how intensely he loves, whether it’s Xiao Zhan’s fantastic acting, or it’s him busting out with how much he wants Lan Wangji in the middle of the Guanyin Temple scene. He’s a fantastic character, honestly, I don’t think such a convoluted book would have held together very well without a protagonist this strong.

Second favorite: Xue Yang :X Look, he’s a good boy and I love him. Who among us hasn’t done a few mass murders that we are completely unrepentant about, but that we would really like to keep hidden from our current boyfriend, actually? Anyways, as always, love me an angry boy who makes terrible decisions for understandable reasons. And I do love a character who is consumed by agonized ragrets (see my next entry), but I DO also love me a character who has no regrets at all and doesn’t even have much interest in trying to justify himself to anyone else around him. Just look at that confidence! Look at him go!!

Most favorite: Jiang... Cheng....... I knew he and Xue Yang were going to be at the top, but those were the only parts of this list that were easy. I mean. Love a self-sabotaging angryboy who is also super super sad and keeps hurting himself in his own confusion. And while I love the romantic thread in all of the mxtx books, the agonized family thread in mdzs is one of my favorite parts, and something that I don’t really see echoed in any of the other stories. I need ten million jc+wwx reconciliations, at LEAST. He’s so sad! And so angry! And I want to see him becoming less of that thing, and for Jin Ling and Wei Wuxian to demonstrate very firmly how much they love him, because they do. I am invested in his happiness in a way that goes far and beyond any of the other non-main characters, haha

SVSSS

Fifth favorite: Tianlang-jun. I think? Oh god, but moshang. THIS IS REALLY HARD, I HATE THIS ;-; But especially since writing my fic, Tianlang-jun has really won me over. And like, he already hurt me good in the novel, just thinking about how he was an innocent young guy, just! Trying to have a girlfriend! And instead got trapped in sensory deprivation, body-rotting-hell for twenty years, when he didn’t do anything wrong!!! He suffered, so much! And I live for his intensely strained relationship with Luo Binghe, because it’s! Perfectly understandable and painful, from both of their perspectives! And he wants to hate humans so badly, but in the end, when he’s told that Su Xiyan never betrayed him, he starts helplessly asking the people around him, ‘really? is it really true?’ and then in the end he loses the only family member he has left who cares about him, and it’s just! Everything is terrible! I have a su xiyan au brewing in my head because I can’t stand it! Someone just give this man a loving partner!!!

Fourth favorite: Shen Qingqiu. But... moshang??? Goddammit. Anyways, this dumbass. I find him so endearing, in his dumbassery. I sometimes get a bit frustrated with Wei Wuxian for being oblivious, and Shen Qingqiu is just asking for me to react the same way, but I... don’t, for the most part? Because he thinks he has good information, and he’s slow to react to a changing playing field, and I still haven’t read another transmigration novel that strikes the same balance of hypercompetence and intense incompetence :ppp It’s a funny book, and he’s a funny character! And I really vibe with him, in most parts of the story, which covers a pretty darn wide emotional spectrum. Plus, the running internal commentary is choice.

Third favorite: Liu Qingge. Look, I’m a woman of simple needs, and sometimes I just need a high-quality fightboy who clearly cares deeply and is absolute garbage at expressing his emotions. I can’t articulate it much better than that. I absolutely howl at the succubus extra, when Shen Qingqiu is talking to Madam Meiyin about his future partner, and Liu Qingge is like ‘oh my god, sHE IS CLEARLY DESCRIBING ME’ and Shen Qingqiu is like ‘haha, liu-shidi, i thought you thought this was stuupidddddddd’. They’re both so dumb. I love them so much. But stupidity plus war god fighting energy has a narrow lead over stupidity and internal commentary track.

Second favorite: SHEN JIU. GOD. I’m still arguing with myself over whether he should go first, but Luo Binghe hurts me consistently through the whole entire story, so I think he wins. Shen Jiu just stabs me in the heart at strategic moments. This is it. My ideal mean boy who is soft for one (1) person, and who BOTH does unconscionable things for terrible reasons (someone just. give him a pile of girls to teach, it will be much more pleasant for everyone involved), and who ALSO gets blamed for things he didn’t do even when he tries to act in good faith. It is the best of all painful worlds. And even at the end, when he has a powerful person who wants desperately to protect him, he still tries his hardest to shove that person away, to keep him safe. I’ve got like four aus where he gets to live. I’m so invested in this character, I love him so much.

Most favorite: Luo Binghe. He was.... made for me............ Like, the overwhelming amounts of childhood angst were baked in by Shang Qinghua, but the in-story pain and suffering is PRECISELY my jam. I love a character with separation anxiety! I love a character with massive anxieties over being unwanted! Over nobody ever, EVER just choosing him! I love a character struggling with the idea that the person he loves most in the world thinks that he’s intrinsically Disgusting! I love the kind of stubborn determination that leads him to preserve a corpse for five years, desperately hoping for a way to revive it, constantly cooking fresh food, in case, in case he someday wakes up. The way Hua Cheng loves is overpowering, but he’s had time to like... learn to be mellow when he needs to be. Luo Binghe doesn’t have a chill bone in his body, and if he’s acting chill, it’s probably because he’s done some mental math and decided that being more clingy right now will probably get him pushed away harder. I love the combination of manipulative tendencies and a very, very genuine fear of rejection and being unwanted. There is nothing I don’t love about Luo Binghe, including his worst decisions. I love him so so much.

#spock replies #long post/#svsss #mdzs #tgcf #thanad-zid

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skullsandwineglasses · 3 years

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My Best Friend’s Story (2020) Final Review

I’ve written two first impressions of this drama here (first episode impression) and here (episodes 1-7 impression). Beyond the first 7 episodes, I continued to enjoy the drama until episode 24 or so. But when Jiang Nansun returned from Italy, that’s when the drama started to go downhill for me. One good thing that I appreciated in this drama is that the personalities of the characters stayed relatively consistent, which is an accomplishment for cdramas. However, my gripe was with how the ambitions of the characters changed. Even though the plot was quite simplistic in the first half of the drama, it felt like Nansun and Suosuo were actively moving the plot forward. They had agency over their own growth. But in the second half, they were striving for things they didn’t want. Rather, they were coping with life stressors and making compromises. It might sound like a realistic depiction of the unpredictability of life struggles, but what was frustrating about the plot progression was that both Nansun and Suosuo made things harder than they had to be.

Jiang Nansun

I actually really liked Nansun’s character development. She didn’t just grow for the sake of growing, but we see her potential of becoming someone competent and independent early on. This means that sooner or later, she would become a mature woman over time, but her father’s suicide triggered this growth sooner than expected.

Despite having an opposite upbringing from Suosuo, Nansun and Suosuo are actually quite similar in terms of their outlook on life and their judgments of people. That’s why they’ve managed to stay best friends for so many years. What’s different between them is that Suosuo has had to stand up and protect herself more often. This means that she’s used to being confrontation.

Nansun is a bit more reserved. She does things more underhandedly. She’s more of a schemer. When you see how she handled things with Yuan Yuan, we see how she’s not above lying and bribery to safekeep her sense of security. Even Suosuo was shocked about how cleverly and calmly Nansun was able to figure out the truth of her boyfriend’s past with Yuan Yuan.

But, we also see that Nansun is also capable of being just as spoken as Suosuo. She openly bickers with Wang Yongzeng. She never hesitates to stand up to her dad. When you look at the women in Nansun’s life, you can see where she gets her gumption from. Her aunt is a level-headed, well-traveled business woman. Her mom is a self-aware but oppressed housewife. Her grandmother is an overbearing traditionalist. All three women are resilient, if flawed. Nansun may have had a privileged upbringing, but she’s capable of facing adversity and adapting to changing circumstances. It’s also because of these three women that forced Nansun to have to think for herself.

I think what a lot of people had issue with is how Nansun handled her father’s outstanding debts. She kept it a secret, refusing to tell anyone about it because she was afraid of burdening them. So, she took it all on herself. As a result, her aunt and her boyfriend misunderstood her and was disappointed that she would choose earning fast money over pursuing her passion. I’m still trying to figure out whether this decision makes sense for her character. Nansun justifies the decision by saying that she doesn’t want to worry and burden her loved ones like her father did. Nansun also said that telling Wang Yongzeng about her problems would just ruin his current passionate and carefree approach to life.

But one of the reasons why she broke up with Zhang Anren was because he refused to help her in her time of need because he didn’t want to be associated with her dad’s gambling habits. You would think that after having such as a selfish and unreliable boyfriend, she would expect her next boyfriend to be more supportive and compassionate. They writers even set up WYZ to be more compassionate. When he heard the news that Nansun’s dad came to the university to ask Zhang Anren for money, he called all the way from Italy to ask if he could help. So I thought that WYZ would be more involved when Nansun encounters another problem. But no. Instead, Nansun doesn’t even give him a chance to help her because she wanted to protect him from her reality and her struggles.

We then see a third love interest appear: Li yifan. He’s like a more genuine version of Zhang Anren. He plans everything to the T. He has a clear plan for the future. He’s reliable, dependable, and will guarantee a sense of security. He sees marriage as a contractual partnership, and romantic gestures are superficial. They’re just fantasies that you dreams about when you’re young, but they’re hollow and unsustainable. You know that if you marry him, you won’t have to worry about him being unfaithful and that you’ll always be provided for. He’s direct, transparent, to-the-point, and no nonsense. His ex-wife tells Nansun it’s important to find a man who’s is emotional calm and stable. He seems like a perfect marriage partner. I’ve seen lot of comments saying that he’s better suited for Nansun than WYZ is.

The thing is, while you can’t go wrong if you chose Li yifan, he doesn’t offer anything that Nansun can’t provide for herself. Back in grad school, Nansun liked Zhang Anren because he pampered her, and love and attention was something that she lacked from her family at home. But now, Nansun has learned to love herself and provide for herself. She’s able to give herself a sense of security, and she no longer needs a man to provide it for her. Instead, she wants a partner who is able to emotionally and intellectually stimulate her, and WYZ can provide this. He’s able to show her a different side of life. She’s able to have fun with him. He helps her grow and draws her out of her comfort zone.

Nansun likes WYZ not because of what he can give her, but because of who he is. That’s why even though he doesn’t help her overcome her obstacles (because she didn’t let him), she still loves him. She likes his personality, his values, his free spirit, his humour. She’s able to provide her own noodles, but he offers the spice.

The conversation that Nansun has with her aunt also becomes important. Her aunt says that marriage is just a confirmational contract, but it’s not the foundation of a relationship. That’s why her aunt doesn’t feel a need to remarry and is perfectly happy with just dating.

So in the voiceover during the final scene, Nansun says that she and Susuo continued to live together for the next 5-6 years, implying that she and WYZ didn’t get married. WYZ also mentioned a few episodes ago that marriage and starting a family wasn’t on his agenda. So we as the audience are left to assume that Nansun is following in her aunt’s footsteps and isn’t in a rush to get married or start a family. Just as long as she’s happy spending time with the one she loves, that’s all that matters. She’s finally broken out of her family’s traditionalist values after all and is career-driven.

Another note is that the library scene during Nansun and WYZ’s reconciliation in the finale was pretty romantic. In fact, I thought their whole relationship arc was cute and really enjoyed seeing it unfold. The chemistry just wasn’t quite there, but most couples in this drama lacked chemistry.

Zhu Suosuo

Suosuo had an anticlimactic character arc, but she was a pitiful character and arguably the emotional core of the drama.

She starts off ambitious, headstrong, but naive. She’s the Cinderella character: she’s stuck in her uncle’s judgmental home, dreaming of one day moving out and having her own family and being independent and successful. She’s tricked by a man, but it’s a blessing in disguise because it also puts her on the path of entering the Jinyan company. She finds quick (but shortlived) success as a real estate agent, and gains a reputation at the company. We see her gain momentum as she climbs up the ladder, getting closer to realizing her dream. But it all stagnates when she’s re-assigned to be Jinyan’s assistant.

She’s no longer running from client to client to try to recruit sales. Instead, she’s now stuck at the office, slowly falling in love with her boss who’s old enough to be her father. She doesn’t really do anything anymore but swoon over Ye Jinyan. And it gets cringey because she begins to assume that he likes her back and begins to act out of line, like questioning his decisions for the company and for his employees. When he scolds her for thinking too highly of herself and her influence in the company when she’s nothing more than just an assistant, she quits.

This points to a larger problem of the drama. What kind of lesson is the drama peddling? So far, for both Nansun and Suosuo’s storylines, it seems as though the drama is saying that as long as you’re young, pretty, and have rich connections, you’ll be fine. Most of Nansun and Suosuo’s problems have been solved by someone rich (usually Ye Jinyan). It’s unrealistic how fortunate and privileged they are. They knows so many influential people who are ready and eager to help them.

Another problem is how the drama villainizes people from the country and depicts people from the city as being morally superior. The prime example is Yuan Yuan. She’s portrayed as the greedy, scheming, love rival who wants to get in the way of all of Nansun’s relationships. At first, I was annoyed at how lazy it was to bring her back to try to steal WYZ. But on second thought, it was interesting to see how differently Nansun reacts to Yuan Yuan compared to a year ago, and how uninterested WYZ is in her compared to Zhang Anren. It shows that Nansun has matured. She’s no longer jealous of Yuan Yuan because she’s confident and secure in her relationship with WYZ, and she trusts him in a way that she couldn’t trust Zhang Anren. And that’s because WYZ’s behaviour makes him worthy of being trusted.

Yuan Yuan’s appearance also gives Suosuo a chance to show her rage and protective side. It was really satisfying seeing Suosuo call out Yuan Yuan’s intentions.

I lost interest in watching Suosuo’s relationship with Jinyan. By that point in the drama, Suosuo seemed to have lost her drive to further her career. So while she’s still as headstrong, outspoken, and flirty as ever, her ambitions have changed. I’m also trying to understand why Suosuo fell for Jinyan. Is it the idea of being liked by the most powerful man in the company? Is it because he’s aloof hard to get? She wants a home and family, things that he is unlikely to give. And yet, she’s drawn to him. Not Yang Ke who’s smart and not Xie hong zu who worships her.

What’s more curious is Jinyan’s side of the relationship. At first it’s ambiguous. He cares for her, but doesn’t show it outright. You then learn that it’s because Suosuo has the exact same birthday as his daughter who committed suicide, and he still blames himself for being an absent father. So he’s trying to repent by doing his best to protect and love Suosuo, whom he treats as a stand-on for his deceased daughter. But then there are moments that make you question that line of reasoning. He reminisces the time he spends with Suosuo. He accidentally calls his secretary by her name. He drinks to try to numb the pain of her absence. He’s enraged when she quits. He cries when gets she married (and it’s not the kind of happy crying that a parent would have, but it looks like a kind of regretful crying where he turns his back to the camera, takes off his sunglasses, and blinks the tears away). Or maybe it is a kind of worried parental crying because he knows that she won’t have a happy marriage with Xie hong zhu. It’s all very hard to tell. Does he love her platonically is romantically? Maybe a bit of both. He’s probably unsure himself.

Suosuo seemed to jump into marriage with Xie hong zhu too quickly. She admits that it’s partly out of spite from being rejected by Jinyan, but it’s also because she realizes that Xie hong zhu is probably her best choice now. Suosuo and Nansun’s lives seemed to have switched: at the beginning of the drama, Nansun was the one who dreamed of romance and marriage, while Suosuo dreamed of freedom of success. Now, Suosuo is the one who’s eager to find a romantic partner, while Nansun is trying to find a foothold in her profession. But when you think about it, that’s who’ve they been all along. Even though Suosuo said that romance is a lie and an unreliable fantasy, a part of her still hopes to find happiness with someone who truly loves her. Nansun starts off having a seemingly devoted boyfriend, so romance was never something she thought she lacked, which was why in the end, she was able to figure out what she really wanted out of her love live. My mom always tells me to find someone who loves me more than I love them. Suosuo seemed to have taken this route. I think that you should love someone because of who they are, even if they might not love you back. Nansun was lucky to have found someone she loves who loves her back. Suosuo wasn’t as lucky.

After a long and bumpy road, Suosuo finally returned to basics and is working in sales again. But I was just disappointed at how they stunted her career growth just as she was rising.

Nansun and Suosuo’s relationship

My initial criticism was that they weren’t really involved in each other’s lives. But that changed when Suosuo leaves her uncle’s place and is taken in by Nansun’s family. And then Nansun’s family falls into financial ruin and Suosuo takes them in her new place. And then Nansun’s father dies and her mother leaves, leaving only Nansun and her grandmother, whom Suosuo treats as her own grandmother. And they get even closer when Suosuo has a baby. So we see how they get closer and closer through all the problems they face together. But it’s obvious and predictable how devoted they are to each other. So whenever one makes a sacrifice for the other, it’s never a surprise. It’s very sweet and comforting to watch though, and the drama is worth watching for their friendship dynamic alone.

A lot of people criticize Liu Shishi’s acting, and while I also don’t find her to be a strong actor, I think she has good chemistry with Ni Ni. They balance each other out. They both have so much grace and composure. I also really like how evenly split their storylines were. Soulmate and Last Romance seemed to be biased towards the bubbly character more (i.e., Zhou dongyu and Cherrie Chung respectively), but in this drama, no lead had more screen time or priority than the other.

The male leads

Nothing needs to be said about Chen Dao Ming. He’s untouchable. I’m not even qualified to talk about him. Dong Zi Yan did the best with the script he was given. He was childish, immature, lovesick, hurt, conflicted, remorseful. You felt sorry for him even though he was an unlikable character. Tony Yang had a flat character, so he wasn’t given much to work with, but his Taiwanese accent was distracting, and I’m not even a fluent mandarin speaker, I’m cantonese. So it must have been more annoying for native speaker. A lot of people complained about him, but I think he looks good in modern day clothes, and he fits the role of a casual, laid back, handsome architect well. He looked terrible and sleazy in The Rebel Princess though.

Supporting characters

Fan Jin Gang, Yang ke, and Xia Qian (the aunt) are definitely people you want to have in your life. They are infinitely wise and compassionate, but very blunt. Yuan Quan definitely embodies the worldly aunt stereotype. You wish you could be her when you grow up.

Overall, I would say that this is a good drama. Probably a 7.5/10. It’s really slow, but I didn’t skip any scenes. I started watching it for Liu Shishi and Ni Ni, and then I watched it for the relationships, and then I watched it for the conversations that the characters had. There are a lot of good life advice in this drama, and it makes you reflect on your own relationships with friends and family. It’s a thoughtful story.

The OST was great, the cinematography tried too hard to be nostalgic, and the outfits were fashionable. When they went to “Italy” you could tell that they just chose a European-style neighbourhood in China and then put in clips from Europe. The drama used the long, overhead drone shot that slowly pans out in the last scene of the finale. It’s such an overused shot. Off the top of my head, I remember that Lost Romance does this, and so does Ashes of Love, The Rebel Princess, and My Girlfriend is an Alien. While cheesy, I do find these drone shots pretty impressive, especially when you wonder where the rest of the crew is hiding. But I feel like this drama would have been better off ending with a montage of their lives 5 years later. After all, this is a drama about personal growth and the passage of time, so it only makes sense to see how much has changed in 5 years instead of being told in a voiceover. I know they wanted the last shot to be of Nansun and Suosuo standing together, but I think it might be more impactful to see them separated, but still staying strong despite the distance.

I could probably go on and an about this drama. You could go into a deep dive analysis about every character.

Ni Ni outfit appreciation:

Here are the brands of some of the outfits.

#my best friend's story #流金岁月 #cdrama #倪妮 #刘诗诗 #ni ni #liu shi shi #cdrama review #cdramaedit #cdramanet

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archonreviews · 7 years

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The Archon’s Opinion: What Does it Mean for Good Characters to Have Bad Games; or, the Curious Case of Sonic the Hedgehog

Hey, guess who can’t count to five? This Archon! Whoo!

Anyway, I wanted to discuss something that’s been on my mind since Sonic Mania came out a while back, and even since the Game Grumps (hi guys) began their playthrough of Sonic Unleashed. That thing is simply: why is it that though Sonic the Hedgehog is a good character, the games about him are... not so good. On this episode of The Archon’s Opinion, we’re going to determine the why, what, and how, of the atrociousness of Sonic games. Or maybe I’ll just ramble on about how awesome Shadow Sonic is. Who knows?

Let’s start out by defining what it is that makes Sonic a “good character”. What I mean by “good character” is one who is largely appealing, and one who is either deep or punchy, one you have to think a lot about or one you can immediately recognize and empathize with. In this case, Sonic is the latter; he’s got an easily-recognizable silhouette, and a fun and easy-to-memorize suite of powers (goes fast, can go super-saiyan, can roll good, spikes sharp). Also, while the particulars of his personality depend on the writer, he’s generally consistent in his carefree-but-righteous nature. Most people like to think of themselves as morally upright, and many people, I should think, prefer to think of themselves as being fun-loving and care-free, like Sonic in a way. So, Sonic the Hedgehog is both punchy and easy to follow, and broadly appealing.

Next, a little context about Sonic’s history in video games. Back in ye olden dayes, Sonic the Hedgehog came out for the SEGA Genesis. It was a pretty standard platforming game, with an emphasis on speed and semi-complex environments. It was meant as a direct competitor to the Mario Bros. series, and it sold like hotcakes on a cold morning, or something like that. Sonic’s 2 and 3, as well as 3 and Knuckles all also did really well, financially speaking. Things only began to run downhill when Sonic Adventure was released. Poor dialogue, mediocre plot, and annoying characters dragged down the game significantly. Things seemed to uptick with the release of Sonic Adventure 2, which had some problems, but in terms of plot, characters, controls, and graphics, it was a vast improvement. Sonic Heroes was largely a blank in terms of critical reception, getting average reviews among publications, and mixed reviews from individual critics. Sometime later... came the dark ages.

^(Ugh)^

^(Uuulgh)^

^(Bluuurgh, no.)^

^(Huh)^

^(Hey, okay.)^

^(Aaaargh! Ah Gottirn, nein!)^

While Sonic Colors and Generations provided brief, dim lights in the darkness that followed Adventure 2, they were not enough to save Sonic’s critically damaged reputation. Many people, players and critics alike, have gone on record as saying that Sonic should be put down for good, each individual having their own opinion as to when he should have been dropped.

So, we have a character who is consistently likable and eminently marketable, but who is the subject of a swath of poor video games. And yet, despite the utter abhorrence many Sonic titles languish in, he still has plenty of fans. Why is this?

Perhaps the answer lies in other media that Sonic has been in. For example, the Sonic the Hedgehog comic series has generally been received positively. One might very easily argue that this is because the comic series lacks the various elements that made the games really bad. After all, you don’t have to rely on shitty controls to make Sonic do his thing in a comic series, and the character’s voices can be as cool or as terrible as you imagine them to be. Also, the plots are written by people who’s job it is to write plots! Amazing! And the graphics are drawn by people who are trained to draw comic book art. Also amazing!

^(Pictured: Something I’d totally read)^

In this way, the comics make use of Sonic’s personality and abilities, without forcing you to wrestle with poorly implemented controls or terrible glitches. We get his character, without his game. The same goes for the television series; although, none of the television adaptations seem to sell quite as well as the comic. Possibly because of the voices of... certain characters.

So how can Sonic Team and SEGA make Sonic games better while preserving Sonic’s character? What really is the deal with Sonic games? Well, game journalist and professional... Boglinwatcher, I guess... Jim Sterling, has actually made the point that after the relative failure of Sonic ‘06, SEGA kept trying different things to make the games good, many of which failed. He went on to say that each of the games presented an interesting concept, and that each could have been a great game, if it were refined. His argument was if SEGA had stuck to a single concept or idea long enough to make it good, then Sonic games could be good, Q.E.D.

To see that idea in action, we can take a look at SEGA’s direct competitor, Nintendo. In many ways, Nintendo’s flagship characters are much like Sonic the Hedgehog. Por exemple, Mario has a very basic set of abilities, an easily-recognizable silhouette, and his bright colors and blank-slate personality make it easy for us to project ourselves onto him as we play. Link from the Legend of Zelda games, is very similar, with a simple-ish design, a monotone color scheme, and a classic story arc.

Consider now, that Nintendo has, with few exceptions, been pumping out the same Mario and Zelda games for years. Mario has had plenty o’ platformers, and Link has a lot of adventure games. One does not create using the same formula over and over without becoming very good at it, and refining it to a razor polish. Mildly mixed metaphors aside, this is, essentially the main difference between Nintendo’s properties and Sonic the Hedgehog; Sonic games can have all the interesting ideas in the world, but if they’re not refined, they just won’t be very good as compared to a more polished experience.

Now, we’ve all heard the flagship complaints carried by Sonic’s detractors. The first is that because he’s too fast, and because depth perception in a 3d environment is difficult, Sonic simply cannot exist competently in a 3d space. Q.E.D. any 3d Sonic game will be bad. I disagree; I believe that 3d Sonic’s relative atrociousness isn’t an intrinsic property of 3d physics’ interaction with Sonic’s speed, but that Sonic Team simply don’t often design environments wherein the two elements play well. When stages are constructed to take advantage of Sonic’s characteristic speed, such as the first level in Sonic Adventure and some of the “Regular Sonic” stages in Unleashed, they’ve often been described as good, or even the best parts of those games. Really, the problem isn’t Sonic, it’s Sonic’s developers, who don’t seem to know how to handle him.

Another common complaint is that Sonic’s ever-expanding team of sapient animal friends is drawing the games away from their core focus. Such detractors will say that any stage in which you are you are, say, being Tails in a mech, instead of being Sonic and going fast, is somehow a detriment to the game’s quality. Again, I have to disagree; plenty of games have many different core mechanics that form the whole game, and I think maybe instead of insisting that every Sonic game be about going fast exclusively, we should look at any stage in which we get to play as a new character as an interesting new experience; even if we don’t personally like it; we can at least appreciate that the particular game in question isn’t monotone. That said, those critics who claim that the other character’s personalities and voices are irritating may have a point, at least in the grand generality of Sonic games.

Finally, I want to talk for a moment about the relative success of Sonic Mania, and the stigma that 3d Sonics have acquired. See, Mania has been hailed as this return to form for Sonic the Hedgehog, and that’s not without merit. The game essentially has classic Sonic’s turgid wang firmly in it’s mouth, and while that isn’t necessarily a bad thing, I feel like it could lead to a bad thing. A lot of the complaints about modern Sonics has been about the 3d aspects, and Mania is 2d, you see. What I’m worried about it that Sonic Team might see the success and praise for Mania and think that the number of dimensions is the problem, instead of the lack of polish, the glitches, the unlikable sidekicks, etc. And therein lies a risk of a return to the problem Jim Sterling mentioned, wherein Sonic Team simply abandons an aspect of Sonic games because they think that it specifically is the reason it didn’t do well, and thus, it may lead to merely another unpolished Sonic game, except in 2d.

فى الختام،, Sonic games suffer primarily from a severe lack of polish, overall glitchiness, and a menagerie of annoying ancillary characters, truly. But they have not suffered from 3d, or from Sonic’s own character. To fix this, Sonic Team should stick to one or a few core elements for the games, at least for a while, until they get good at it, before trying to get fancy.

^(Or they could just release Shadow the Hedgehog 2 already. Whatever works for them.)^

#archon's opinion #article #sonic the hedgehog

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iamsielow · 5 years

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China has a HUGE problem … And Trump will ultimately win.

China has a HUGE problem. Actually China has about FIVE HUGE problems and because of this Trump will, ultimately, win in his actions against them.

First China is a corrupt place. Like MANY Communist countries, China cannot exist without lying; lying to itself, lying to other countries, lying to its citizens. While I admit many countries have leaders who lie to their subjects, they usually do so for power. China lies to its people not only for power but to survive, to continue to exist.

The harshness of China's history, the mandatory lies created by a Communist system and its endless sea of citizens leads to the complications causing it problems in today's world.

For today's post, let's concentrate on the HUGE problem China has when it comes to farming.

China has no qualms about executing farmers who do not meet their quotas. China also has no qualms about executing regional farming directors whose farmers miss their quotas. Due to this unique process of encouraging job productivity, the farmer lies about his expected crop yield. The regional directors collect these estimates and happily report to their superiors that all is well and the expected crop yields will be whatever the country's leadership demands it to be. They know the data is probably false, but reporting the values demanded keeps them alive for another day.

In the past, at whatever administrator level the Truth was finally admitted to, that person's boss might have the person admitting the Truth executed and every bureaucrat and farmer under him executed as a lesson to all farmers what happens if you fail to meet expected quotas. Once executed, another farmer and another bureaucrat from the endless supply of both would chosen to replace those who were "forced into retirement" and all would be well until the next harvesting season started.

It is, in the end, Communism working as intended.

This history of quickly solving any production problems with a bullet to the head works its way up the chain of command until you reach the people who have options available to avoid the quick "employee adjustment" option which makes their wives widows. The simple answer is they purchase American grain to make up any shortfall in the expected yields of the farmers and administrators below them.

In other words, they use American grain, sometimes purchased on the black market, to "balance the books."

This process has been going on so long it has become second nature. The farmers inflate the expected yield to government demanded levels. Their regional directors make sure all reported values come within expected goals. Up the ladder the figures travel until the national directors factor in the expected crop yields into their urban planning.

The actual farming yields then come in well below needs, the regional directors nervously report the short fall up the chain to equally nervous supervisors until it eventually reaches the people who have wider options. These people have additional discretionary spending options. These options include purchasing the nice, clean, abundant, INEXPENSIVE USA grain to feed the hungry nation.

The Chinese citizens get fed, the centralized government doesn't ask questions, and the various farmers and quota counters survive another year.

This process makes the current world events very complicated for the Chinese leadership. They look at the falsified data and assume that American grain is merely a small additive to the country's food supply; that if needed, the country can easily survive without it. A false conclusion built upon a process that originated as a defense in China's lack of respect for human life.

So when Donald Trump comes along and doesn't put up with China's endless game of saying one thing and doing another, the Chinese leadership begins trenching in to do battle with Trump, assuming that any missing USA grain will simply be a small distraction to the action.

It's not.

It's a HUGE issue.

It's an issue which China will shortly discover will condemn its people to what is called the "North Korean Banquet." The North Korean Banquet mainly consists in mixing in a LOT of soil into your meals to make up for the lack of real food.

But China has another (of several) issue(s)! If you have followed my advice and watched some of the YouTube videos produced by "China Uncensored" you would have seen the video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=arNiV5_W5Ck) in which the channel interviews Chinese citizens vacationing in Hong Kong (more on that in a minute).

While the subject of the video is important, you should have realized something else while watching it: Hong Kong, due to its freedoms and available western goods, is considered a vacation goal for mainland Chinese based workers. Watching this video, notice that all the people being interviewed basically look like office workers who came to Hong Kong like an American citizen might plan a vacation to Michigan. They wear comfortable, causal clothing, have dorky hair cuts, and wear fashionable glasses. They are relaxed, well fed and have money to spend -- spend in Hong Kong.

In the 1950's, 1960's and even the 1970's, China had an abundance of farmers and laborers it could draw upon to throw into any conflict it engaged in. Vietnam? Korea? Just grab a few hundred thousand ignorant farmers from their fields, shove a rifle into their hands, point them at the American outpost you want overwhelmed and warn them not to slip in the blood of their fellow farmers as they rush the American positions.

Now, however, you lack as many of those ignorant farmers that China once had. Instead you have a sizable number of accountants, bookkeepers, school teachers, computer support specialist and other infrastructure people vacationing in Hong Kong.

Just like American citizens vacationing in Georgia.

Today's Chinese citizens understand guns and killing in concept but in their entire lives they have never actually killed anything to eat it. Just like in America, hamburger comes from the grocery store, not your neighbor's cow. Shove a gun in their hands and order them to storm an outpost? "Surely there's a less violent solution, right? I have to have the Wang report on my boss's desk by Friday."

In short, a LOT of Chinese are actually enjoying their lives. The concept of simply throwing those lives away is something they will actively avoid. Oh, on command they will still shout "China! China! We the Best! We can take on the West!" but in real life they are mainly worried about producing reports on next month's Chu Widget production.

In addition to this, it has been known for some time that during the May Day parades, as the Communist countries proudly march their military might down the main street of the capital cities, some of the missiles on display are made of cardboard, some of the rifles being carried are held together with duct tape. Faked constructs created to hide the failings of missile production and true military status of the country. Just like in Iraq and North Korea, if anyone knew how badly the Chinese missile and weapons program were being handled the country might fear organized attacks led by Falun Gong mother-in-laws.

Then there's Hong Kong (I told you I'd get here). Because of all the structured lies in the Communist system, the government of China is proceeding with its planned absorption of Hong Kong fully into the Communist controlled, Chinese bureaucratic structure. The Hong Kong people, having grown accustom to their freedoms AND having more access to more diverse information than the average Chinese citizen, understand what this means. The funny thing is it's not just the loss of freedoms they object to, but the endless levels of corruption of the Chinese system that disturbs many of the Hong Kong citizens. The Chinese triggering event for the recent actions, the arrest of a Hong Kong citizen for deportation into the Chinese "justice" system, sent chills through any person who has seen the Richard Gere movie " Red Corner*" more than once.

*If you haven't seen the 1997 movie, it details the level of corruption and lack of TRUE due process that exists in the Chinese court system; a system where you are guilty until you can be tortured until admitting to being guilty, no matter what your true status once was.

In any case, the Chinese government, due to the corrupt status of its nature, has over estimated the ease in which Hong Kong would join the greater Chinese governing system.

Then there is the Chinese gender problem (which will be detailed in a future post) which only adds to the continuing Chinese Taiwan problem.

In short, the Chinese Government is currently built on sand. This means their underlying base has been weakened by endless years of solving problems with a bullet to anyone stupid enough to Truthfully report the dangers in the aspects of the Chinese infrastructure. They built their government on a system where lying for effect means surviving another day.

China is also still controlled by aging generals who lack a clear understanding of what today's society is like and an understanding of the actual love of life the current citizens have. They have elder members of the ruling party who actually think that sacrificing a few million citizens will not affect those who remain to fill in for the ones who were eliminated.

They do not understand that while one farmer can replace another (no offense), no one understands the Wang Reports like the person who was just forced to join the military. Because of this, China will soon have some serious Wang issues.

These false beliefs in the sturdy nature of the Chinese government are contributing heavily to China's HUGE problem. With the American President, Donald Trump, actually holding China accountable to the corruption other USA presidents have looked away from, when his push comes to Chinese shove, the Chinese system will soon buckle and collapse like a ... Well, like attempting to launch a cardboard missile.

Eventually, the Chinese leadership will begin to see the citizens growing even more restless than they already have. They will discover that in the current age, the availability of an endless supply of short lived and short-life farmers that can be converted into soldiers has been drastically changed into happy people expecting long, happy lives.

Even among the farmers!

No Communist system can survive long when trying to govern happy people. Not even China's.

There is more to this. As we move forward I will document this further and explore other insights I have gained in my exploration of this world.

I Am Sielow, These are my words.

If you like what you have seen and read, please consider supporting me at: www.subscribestar.com/IamSielow

#DonaldTrump China Communism

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technologywearables · 7 years

Text

HTC Vive and SteamVR review - new 2nd Gen Vive Pre developer edition announced at CES

HTC has simply announced that its Vive VR headset is getting a 2nd generation developer edition referred to as the HTC Vive Pre. The emerging headset has a brand new front encountering cam, boosted room-scale innovation as well as a lighter, a lot more ergonomic headset as well as controller design.

According to HTC, 'each and also every part has actually been upgraded from scratch to give better comfort, ergonomics and performance', including a much more portable headset as well as a new band product to provide higher stability as well as balance. This consists of the ability to readjust the size of the headset to match various kinds of faces and also, a lot more significantly, having the ability to suit it over glasses.

The display screen is also brighter, with HTC claiming it's made 'picture refinements' to aid raise clarity as well as feeling of visibility. Whether this means a greater resolution is currently unclear.

Another new addition to the Vive Pre is a front-facing video camera, allowing customers to see specific components of their physical atmosphere without having to eliminate the headset. Again, it's not clear just how the Vive Pre will certainly 'blend physical elements into the digital room', however HTC says you'll have the ability to find your seat, drink and come with on conversations with member of the family while immersed in digital reality.

The Vive's controllers have actually been revamped for the Pre also, including softer sides, updated functional designs, emerging textured buttons and grip pads for included comfort. The emerging double stage trigger should make things interaction much smoother, while haptic responses should put that added level of immersion. The controllers will certainly have incorporated rechargeable batteries which demand through Micro USB, providing four hours of play time on a single fee. Finally, the Vive base terminals have also been upgraded to be more portable, quieter as well as supply far better tracking.

'When we initially revealed Vive 10 months ago we had an eager goal of basically altering the means people interact as well as connect with the globe - for life," claimed Cher Wang, chairwoman and CEO of HTC. "Considering that after that Vive has actually obtained a phenomenally good reception from media, sector analysts, customers, and the hundreds of companions and also brands we've been dealing with to provide inspiring and vibrant VR material. For also long, the guarantee of virtual truth has been little much more compared to a pledge. Today we base on the precipice of a brand-new period. Vive is creating a globe where the only limitation is human creative imagination."

After being postponed from completion of in 2014, the last version of the Vive is currently expected to launch in April 2016. Let's hope it will be worth the wait.

Everything else you should learn about HTC Vive

Virtual reality is looking readied to be the next huge thing, however it hasn't been a fast transformation, or one with a defined message. Oculus Rift has been the PC gaming community's beloved considering that 2013 (though Facebook's purchase might take the sheen off that love event), after that more just recently we've had Sony's PS4-powered PlayStation VR, the smartphone-based Samsung Gear VR, as well as the Google's VR-for-all Cardboard customer. VR headsets are going to come thick as well as quick over the following year, and also today we obtained to experiment with the HTC Vive, produced in cooperation with PC-gaming leviathan Valve under its SteamVR initiative.

Speaking of behemoths my first experience with HTC Vive at Gamescom 2015 was nothing but awe inducing. Standing on the deck of a submerged ship, I edged towards the prow to look down into the watery abyss below. Noticing, or maybe hearing, something over my left shoulder I looked to discover an enormous whale had actually snuck up on me while I was distracted. I supported away from it in surprise, and also after that marvelled as this glorious leviathan glided past me simply out of reach, its big as well as comprehensive eye monitoring me as it went.

Yes, you check out that right, HTC Vive not just supplies an immersive headset, it likewise has an area tracking system, which allows it to track your actual activities and create them in the virtual globe. What a lot more it labors brilliantly, with both moving as well as turning tracked with extraordinary precision, this lets you go down to your knees then peer out laterally past something in the game world.

HTC Vive

The HTC Vive actually includes 3 components, the Vive headset, a set of place picking up base stations and also two SteamVR control sticks, one for every hand.

The headset looks high as you would certainly expect. It's a regular strap-it-to-your-head VR headset which is similar in size and weight to the existing Oculus model. They're both behind Sony's Morpheus below though, with it's smart ring that distribute the weight in a hat-like fashion as well as leaves the screen merely touching your face, as opposed to pressed versus it.

It's comparable inside also, with a set of 1,080 x1,200 OLED displays, one for each and every eye, yes you can still see the pixel grid if you look hard yet if you're not attempting to choose holes then it stands up effectively. These revitalize 90 times a 2nd therefore give extremely smooth responses in response to your movements. It has a 100 level field of perspective, and also every little thing looked crisp in the center of my perspective, however tailed off when I aimed to seek to the side with my eyes, as opposed to transforming my head. In this regard though it's just like other VR headsets.

The base terminals look more pre-production compared to the headset, being small black cubes with a range of chips on the front. You place them in other corners of your space, creating a square up to 5x5m. Lasers in the terminals are after that tracked by the headset, which as you can see is studded with sensors, in order to determine its specific position and angle, down to a tenth of a degree apparently.

Finally you have the SteamVR controllers. These stick like tools don't appear like considerably, with a single trigger, a touchpad on the front - which is taken from Shutoff's Steam Controller layout - and also an oddly angular head, once again to find it using the laser positioning. You won't be looking at it like that, as in the virtual world it transforms into a range of even more interesting shapes and also devices.

I started off in the white stretch of the initial calibration area. I attempted requesting for 'guns, bunches of weapons' yet to obtain. Exactly what I could do was develop balloons but drawing the trigger on the controller, which would certainly then blow up from the top of the device (or instead a virtual representation of the gadget in sparkling white). The balloons rose gradually yet I can bat them away with the controller, whose activities matched my very own to excellence. The balloons flew off as expected, the only point doing not have being any kind of substantial responses as I bopped them.

Cabled up

A few much more enagaing experiences later on, I was entirely immersed in Vive's digital truth as well as had actually greatly forgotten the darkened area I was actually stood in, somewhere on the just-opened show floor of Gamescom in Cologne. The only snag, essentially, was the cable protruding from the back of my head, as I obtained mesmerized in it a few times when tipping backwards.

For VR experiences when taking a seat it's not a large problem, yet when you're stiring a cord can be a responsibility, so we'll require to see if HTC can develop a method to maintain it out the means, if it was strung at midsection height rather than snaking across the flooring. The wire exists to attach the headset to the heavyweight video gaming COMPUTER needed making those 90Hz visuals run smoothly.

And that's where Shutoff's involvement is available in with its SteamVR campaign. SteamVR is an overarching name including the present HTC Vive Developer Version headset we tried, the SteamVR controllers as well as the free-to-use SteamVR APIs which allow programmers obtain to grips with the hardware.

Job Simulator

Virtual Reality could be pretty disorienting in the beginning, particularly when you add in the complete range of motion readily available with Vive, however Task Simulator is a brilliant way to get readjusted to it. In a world where robots have replaced all human tasks, the 'Work Simulator' allows humans discover just what it was like 'to work'.

The cutesy computer animated scenes are basic, do not bewilder you (unlike the jaw-dropping whale demonstration, which can be a little terrifying the very first time you experience it) yet take care of to immerse you all the very same. Paris Games Week was the initial possibility to experiment with the most current Job, a workplace worker simulation.

As with previous trials, this 'encounter' is meant to have been pictured by robotics, so the keyboard at your desk only has a 0 and a 1 trick, your colleagues are all incorporeal CRT displays as well as the photocopier essentially copies anything you take into it. Nearly every little thing can be communicated with somehow, consisting of the workdesk playthings, staple weapon as well as paper aeroplane that will certainly make you rejecting looks from your adjoining employees. The humour is securely tongue-in-cheek, and also having the ability to dual-wield staplers in temper against your co-workers will have Workplace followers whooping with delight.

You really did not need a massive quantity of area in the demo I played, either, which will certainly make a great deal of people with small rooms full of furnishings extremely happy. You're in an office work area, so a couple of square feet was all that was required. It's simple, yes, but it's enjoyable, as well as we've only seen a fifth of just what programmer OwlchemyLabs has in mind for the last game, which is a validated Vive launch title.

Dota 2: Secret Shop

The peak of the trial came at the end when I reached mess around in the Valve-created Secret Shop. While the other demonstrations were restricted in scope, graphically simplified and also occasionally both, the Secret Store is a luscious fantasy encounter with responds to Shutoff's mind-bogglingly popular Dota 2.

Set in a tiny, weak hut rendered in the vibrant and colourful design acquainted from Dota 2 (and from the majority of Snowstorm's dream franchises too), the Secret Shop starts out dark. The rotund storekeeper shows up and gives a little wonderful light for you to possess. Utilizing this you can explore the shop (which in dimension about associates to the area of activity that the HTC Vive permits) as well as diminish down in dimension to obtain up close with its details.

We viewed in horror as a little spider, not provided significant in our eyes, came close to over a workdesk. We discovered a rack and also were shocked by a massive toad, and lastly the roof covering of the hut was duped by a dragon. It's incredibly immersive stuff as well as beautifully rendered, with lovely, highly-detailed graphics that really reveal exactly what VR might do.

We desired we would certainly had another 10 minutes with the demo, yet we think that would certainly be possibly enough. That statement can be made around considerably of our VR experiences. There just isn't adequate material out there yet to encourage the majority of people, me included, to get rid of their money. I 'd highly suggest you try VR provided a chance however the chicken-and-egg problem of content and also customers might come to be a concern (though HBO, Lionsgate as well as Google are listed as companions).

Can it surVive

HTC as well as Valve's cooperation on SteamVR and Vive is looking extremely solid. The hardware is up there with the best currently readily available as well as the motion monitoring and also controllers are wonderfully carried out. In an industry where 'coming following year' has almost come to be a concept, the Vive's rapid step from principle to implementation goes over. Since creating this short article, HTC Vive has actually slid from a vague 2015 launch, to an unclear Q1 2016 launch (leaving out programmers).

Timing aside, the question is will certainly there be adequate software program to justify a purchase?

Serious COMPUTER players have to be the preliminary targets, as they already have the kind of PCs called for to provide the Vive with very visuals. To date Oculus has made the larger dash, but with the Facebook purchase, several such players prefer to choose a Valve-supported headset. We assume the Vive will certainly deal with a slow-moving start, partly as a result of its high access requirements, but also due to the fact that lots of will simply wait and see how it shapes up to the Oculus in 2016, however in the future it stands a great chance of success. Or comparable to any VR headset at the very least.

#wearables

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