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beatcroc · 1 month

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turns out i have to make an unnecessarily wordy thoughtspost about doombox too bc there is nothing about this character that isn't fucking ridiculous and also really funny and i'm kind of really obsessed with all of it. ordinarily i would just start firing but in this case I need to just. paste his bio and then go through it step by step because every phrase here is absurd when looking at how he's handled along with the other characters and the world as a whole. here we go

first sidenote: i should also add 'nonsensical' to the list of descriptors up there, because this is a fighting game and no doubt has the typical Bad Fighting Game Writing at play that doesn't really hold up when put under scrutiny as i'm about to, but understand that this is something i've come to love about the genre and its typically batshit lore, and it further enhances the experience for me. it's all utter nonsense and its my favorite shit ever.

the biggest thing to me that makes his entire shtick ridiculous is that he was explicitly made to be a weapon. like his express purpose is destruction and/or killing people, and he certainly has the disposition to be doing that. except that he is not doing that. he's out there playing Ball Game, evidently of his own volition.

i feel it is also important to highlight that he was not originally or intentionally a boombox; he just kinda lives in there. his own bio frames it as happenstance, but sonata's dlc skin lore** implies he isn't permanently stuck in there and can kinda just hop out and take control of whatever he wants whenever he wants. there is an entire goddamn tank just sitting there in the background of one of these stages. he is a weapon. there is heavy artillery readily available to him that he could be commanding if he wanted to, but he's not doing that either. he is still a boombox. i think he likes it in there. *there's an argument to be made that maybe he's not powerful enough to control something that large, or maybe just that switching hosts is really tiring or risky. im just saying though there's like a bajillion host devices better suited for A Fucking Weapon than a boombox, but he seems really committed to this for some reason. while im here btw it's fucking terrifying that he apparently can possess thing that are Not tech as well **as a side note from that the specific mention of her boomhammer is interesting. i don't think it's an intentional implication but i enjoy the idea he has an affinity for sound-based devices; i like to think the boombox left an impression on him with its being the initial thing he possessed and got used to

and then there is the berserking. the 'rampaging', as it is otherwise called. not exactly strange on its own given his temperament and designation, but strange for the way it's characterized as only a tendency. it's only that he's prone to rampaging. he rampages often, but not all the time. just often! what is he doing he is not rampaging? getting a custom trimmed jacket with his own logo emblazoned on it? like a nerd? and on the flipside, what exactly do these rampages even entail? because it's apparently not anything destructive or disruptive enough for anyone to care about stopping him under normal circumstances.

like how are you a giant angry "not exactly stable" weapon of a guy and everyone's like 'yeah that's fine. that's our doombox!' toxic's specific wording regarding his getting unfucked postgame is "back to his old raging self", which implies to me there's almost a certain fondness, or at least amusement, at his being like this. i know one of the core themes of lethal league is letting these oddball misfit dudes do their thing and freely be who they are, but like. is doombox sincerely just not a threat for that? like really? dice's interactions also sort of imply that his actually trying to kill someone is really out of the ordinary for him so truly like. db my man what ARE you doing out there. * re: toxic and dice's talking about him; i do also find it amusing that one of his defining traits is just being pissed off all the time. again, not surprising given his purpose/designation as a weapon, but funny in that it's like. how he's KNOWN; in the sense that it is immediately noticeable and a cause for concern for other characters to see he is Not angry. fuckin social barometer of a guy. local angry guy isn't angry, something's wrong.

the "reasons for playing in the league unknown" bit also strikes me as a little odd even though it REALLY shouldn't. i'm like 97% sure it's just written like that to make him seems mysterious and unpredictable and dangerous, but it's a weird thing to call attention to when you consider that...less than half of the other characters' reasons are known? raptor is there trying to get info on his dad, that one's well out there. dust & ashes i think have some kind of implied reason for being there as well but it of course isn't elaborated on, and grid is like trying to impress "the youth" and establish a profile or something. nitro seems like he might not actually be IN the league as an official competitor? it's just helpful for him to know how to ball for the situations he gets into with his investigations. everybody else's "reason" pretty much seems like they're just out there to have fun. and toxic says as much in the story mode intro! the game was developed for people to escape the monotonies of shine city! so to imply doombox has a separate, non-recreational reason for being here is weird. the easiest read on it for me is just that he was drawn to it cause it's intense and destructive but at the same time.... if all he wants is an excuse to wreck shit....why are you competing in a structured sports game with rules and shit my dude. you are a weapon. just go attack people. except that we've established that he doesnt really do that. so. once again. what IS he doing out here

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aside from the bio though, there's of course random little tidbits of characterization throughout the game itself and they are all also likewise ridiculous.

he refers to himself in third person, which is always an amusing choice for a character in general. it carries with it a certain sense of ego, an awareness of and and pride in one's presence and gravitas. this was mostly just surprising to me bc before i started looking at everything, i'd assumed he was more or less mindless and, yknow, robotic; without much personality/reason for being there beyond being the Biggest Baddest Best At Ball Game Guy doombox is already very imposing, so this is frankly a well-earned sense of pride for him to have.....but it still doubles back to being funny again because, as i've established above, he could stand to be a hell of a lot scarier! but he doesn't seem to notice or care that there are many readily-available options for becoming more powerful and/or establishing himself as unquestionable top dog. so instead he is a boombox. third-person is also often used for characters who are a little dumb, and i think this applies to doombox as well. he is a weapon, and clearly a brute-force-over-precision type of weapon at that, he doesnt need smarts. i think this is also sort of hinted at with his voice lines; where the other characters have some kind of snarky phrase or one-liner for their kill/score voice line, doombox just goes "bye-bye". Which is still appropriately Disrespectful, but it's also very, uh... simple. again i just think there are... more imposing things a guy like him could be saying there, but i guess he hasn't got anything more than fucking. bye-bye.

anyways the ego thing i think is well-echoed by his stupid fucking jacket. none of the other characters have their logo as part of their design and i'm pretty sure the rest of the symbols are just game abstractions and don't exist in-universe, but like. doombox is just going around wearing a jersey with his own damn face on it. ok. to be clear i love his jacket but it is literally so silly for him to have that. imagine being the guy having to custom-fit a fucking boombox. did db pay for it? how? we're getting into unproductive territory here but you could ask a million questions about that jacket and they all have hysterical implications. while im on the topic of designs i'd also like to say that while i don't count any of the other blaze redesigns as "canon" like actual events the characters went through between games [like raptor in particular would have already had to have the stitches since that's his backstory, it's just they weren't a design point before], doombox is in a weird spot since the first game's design for him was very specifically referencing its HUD in a meta way for his flavor and that was pretty much the entire extent of his flavor; while in blaze he and the HUD are very much separate distinct things with their own flavor. there's more to talk about here later but as it pertains to design what im saying is i think he just went out and found a better and cooler boombox to be in between games. and also got a funny jacket. *actually i have no idea if there's even a Timeline here. the gut vibe i had been running on was that blaze happens a couple years after the original, but looking at it now that doesn't seem right. does blaze Replace the timeline of the first game? are there even Events in the first game to count as a timeline? do they run concurrently?

alright anyway the last point here is the 3rd-person thing is even moreso interesting to me though bc i was under the assumption that 'doombox' was something akin to a codename he was given when other people saw this big fucking Thang rampaging through the streets. but seeing as 1. he's definitely aware of it, and 2. not even the damn scientists who made him knew he was in a boombox [as implied in his dlc skin lore], i'm led to believe he came up with the name himself. the fucking tape in his cassette player does just say 'doom' on it so i am choosing to believe that's either where he got the name, or that he put that on there himself.

MOVING on, another really good thing is that he does this

i just think it's funny he's continuing to use the thing as an actual boombox; i feel like that isn't something he necessarily Has to do. obviously he's susceptible to certain quirks and limitations of being a boombox re: mind control tape, but i don't think that means he has to play out its every function. i think he's doing that on purpose and i am filing it under "he likes it in there". hes listening to his jams.

also on a similar note,

this is also not important and i realize it's mostly just a quirky videogamey way to get around saying the robot kinda character is "asleep", but i do enjoy the implication that shine city's biggest terror is like out there running on 4 D-cells.

also i'm making this guy out to be a city street menace, and the vibe i had assumed for him before was like, a random encounter in the back alleys that you super do not want to run into; but his associated stage/hangout seems to be the desert/scrapyard? which i don't really have anything interesting to say to that, but it's definitely a different vibe for his character if he typically hangs out in more desolate areas.

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i think maybe the most baffling thing doombox has going on is the apparent "rivalry" with dice. this is also bizzare from dice's side of things. what the fuck does it even mean to be "rivals" with doombox? what are they competing for? what kind of things does dice get up to that doombox would even give a shit about in the first place, let alone to be considered a rival in? i mean, like, the league, probably, but why dice specifically, out of everyone? would doombox's league rival not just be whoever's the [second] strongest there? i believe dice when he says they're evenly-matched, but there isn't really anything that implies dice is of particularly high prestige within the league so it feels like he shouldn't hold much interest as a target. to be fair dice doesn't seem like the type that would care about prestige, but again, if he's not out there flaunting his shit or trying to claim he's the best or whatever, why does db care? this would be a lot easier to understand if it was a one-sided thing on doombox's part like okay maybe dice pissed him off one day and he's still mad about it. whatever. that's the vibe they go for in story mode, but then there's dice's dlc skin description, which seems to run entirely counter to that and has dice as the aggressor:

when deprived of his usual sense and restraint, dice's first thought is I Gotta Go Fuckin Kill Doombox? even if he's over it under normal circumstances, it's clear both of them have some deeper-rooted beef in this exchange. there is yet another layer to this in that doombox is, weirdly enough, not really shown to be the kind of guy that's interested in revenge. again, going back to his own dlc description, he- and i quote- "couldn't care less" about the guys who made him capturing him and chaining him up. his only interest there is breaking out and getting back to doing his thing. if you want to be really generous, you could also read this vibe from the story mode epilogue: doombox was not the one hunting down the safety league, that was nitro. doombox was simply, as stated before "back to his old raging self". both of these to say, he simply does not seem to give a shit about people who have directly wronged him and only wants to Do His Thing. so. once again. what the fuck is going on with dice that they both have lasting beef here. i truly cannot fathom what either of them did to be so mad specifically at eachother. this rivalry is something they reference a LOT too like it's a big deal in-universe, or something otherwise really important to portray. like

lore so strong you gotta put it on an achievement!!!!! really!!!!! and there are no details whatsoever about this????? * while i'm here i'd just like to say have more questions about dice than fucking anything else in this game. sadly there's practically nothing to intuit from the game about any of his situations so i don't have much for coherent thoughts to post on him, but my god. what the fuck, dice. this rivalry is arguably the single strangest thing doombox has going on but it doesn't even break top 5 weird things about dice.

anyways, the final section and MOST interesting thing to me in all this is that, coming out of the first game, i was really under the impression that doombox is just the arbitrary final boss monster you gotta kill; no real purpose or personality his own to speak of, and most importantly just synonymous with the game itself and its aesthetics re: mirroring the HUD design. he certainly still holds the role of big scary final boss monster in blaze too, but blaze 1. has him much more fleshed-out as his own Guy, and more importantly, 2. doesn't really consider him a Problem like your typical big angry final boss monster. or at least not moreso than anything else going on in the game. he's not a threat to be eliminated, he's respected as a character and as a competitor in the league; and more than that he just seems to be... liked? as in, liked by other people in-universe? and he's liked enough that they'll readily help him out so he can keep doing his thing? i do think latch fixed him up postgame mostly bc he felt bad about being the one responsible for getting db brainwashed in the first place but like. the game could have just as easily gone "and then doombox was defeated yay" and left it at that. instead, they seem to have a vested interest in keeping him around. most transparently this is likely just a "we can't get rid of any of the playable characters or else story mode would be noncanon", BUT the point of this post is trying to read cohesive narrative sense into places there probably isn't any, and my read here is that doombox is a sort of inadvertent guardian of the league. for 1, he does still very much embody a lot of what the game [both The Videogame and the league itself] is about, but more importantly i think his presence is just really good at keeping a lot of the more minor threats at bay. if you try to fuck with the league, you will eventually be squaring off with doombox, most likely having freshly pissed him off in the process, and i can't imagine that goes well for who or whatever is in that situation. there's probably not much that wants to stand up to him by himself, and there's even less that can challenge the league as a whole unit; he's really just a good guy to have on your side like in general when you are running an illegal sports operation. i think at Worst toxic might see him as the league's funny little mascot but realistically i think she has more respect for him than that. either way i don't think he's going to care and it doesn't affect him much regardless. for this, doombox simply gets to keep doing his thing, whatever the fuck that may be. there are certainly still forces beyond his control at play here [as demonstrated in story mode by the safety league], and when these come into play, the league in turn looks out for him and keeps him on top of his game. i'm not sure if he has the, uh.... kind of cognitive ability that he could be grateful for this, but if nothing else, we know he seems to enjoy playing in the league, so he probably at least recognizes that he's not going to meet a lot of resistance in it and/or that it's a good environment to keep doing as he pleases. i don't mean for this all to sound so transactional, but it's hard to say whether he has much charisma in-universe for people to want him around for more "legitimate" reasons. likewise, there's also still a lot up in the air on how like... sapient doombox actually is. whether he can have complex motivations about anything or if he has some concept of "having friends" or if he can experience emotions besides rage; i tend to lean to "no" on those because i am really trying my damndest not to woobify this guy, but ultimately i don't think it matters much; in the end, he and the league are still mutually beneficial for eachother, and they still enjoy having the other around. and i think that's pretty cool :)

#lethal league blaze #lethal league #doombox #babygirl i can write misplaced analysis about anythinggggg #also ik im making this post in 2024 but to be clear i've been playing this series since 2016 #i never talk about it much but it has always held a special place 4 me.#i come back to it briefly like semi-anually. it just happened to REALLY grab me this time around for whatever reason #and i got really obsessed w doombox. as it goes i suppose #speaking of which the final word count for this one is.... apparently a little over 3k this time. oh my god.#usually these character/game writeup things are like half that length. look i just think hes neat #as my friend said: ''He seems like he should be so self-explanatory but he just isn't''#and ''We learn just enough about Doombox to know we don't know fucking anything about Doombox''#boy id like to know. the things id do for literally any kind of external loredump for this game. auuggghhh

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slocumjoe · 11 months

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Something I wish they did in fo4 is recognize when you’re cheating on a romanced character… I have a few ideas but I’m curious how you think this should play out in game

This is actually a pervasive...I don't want to call it an issue...roadblock, maybe? In games with romances. Seems like no one knows how to handle this.

Verilybitchie on YouTube has a great video called "bisexuality in video games" that goes into this, so if you don't want to read this, just go put that on in the background.

Also sorry this isn't a react, but I've always had Thoughts on this

So, since this is a Fallout blog, we're talking Fallout first.

In Fo4, you can romance every single companion in the game. Well, the romancable ones (sorry, Nick harem). The only requirement to romance someone is raise their affinity through actions or natural, slow-building of the stat (affinity will slowly raise itself over time), and then you select and succeed at the final romance dice roll. Sometimes there is a quest.

Already we have an issue, because there is no feasible way to logically date all these people. It isn't a numbers issue; it's the fact that most of them hate each other. If you're (you as the sole survivor) can romance and make Hancock swoon for you, its not likely you're the type that can reel Danse. You can't be the kind of person who Preston would fall for, while also pulling Gage. That kind of thing. It isn't that no one would be down to be poly, its that most of them have so few of the others that they'd be poly with. Again, Gage is not sharing with fucking Preston, and he sure as hell isn't falling for someone who Preston can love.

It's just so players can see all the romances, I think, but it's never...it's ludodissonance, I think. At most, a romanced character will hate it if you flirt with someone else in their presence, but I don't believe it'll amount to anything.

So, what would that amount to, IRL? Everyone would be pissed! Their partner has a secret harem that doesn't know its a harem! That's an awful thing to feel. But if Sole sat them all down and explained they wanted all of them at once...still wouldn't work. I don't think any of them would really be comfortable with poly, and all of them have at least one person would they wouldn't want to be poly with. For most of them, that person is Danse. Which is very funny to me.

The thing is, Fallout 4 is a huge game, and making a game is. Fucking Difficult. It is a nightmare. And you'd have to program in all of the different combinations of reactions. That's potentially 144 conversations, if you think about every companion reacting to you being with another companion. Then you have the potential of a companion reacting to you being with two other companions. Three. The number gets insane. And Fallout 4 is humoring us with the socializing/dialog as is, so that's obviously not happening.

In Dragon Age Inquisition, you can flirt with everyone, pretty sure, regardless of romance status. If I remember correctly. But if you romance someone, than try to pursue a romance with someone else, person 2 will waggle their finger at you like nuh-uh-uh, you very naughty boy! Even when it doesn't make much sense for them.

The Iron Bull, for example, i think would be down for a poly relationship. Sera, maybe, I could see that too. Josephine is a manager, so I can see her liking the idea of delegating her love life to an outside contractor when she doesn't have the time. There are romances, here, that could have multiple people. But DAI says no, you can't. But it gets real loosey goosey with what is and isn't cheating.

So, I played that game as a dude, and obviously I went straight for Cassandra, my buff book nerd warrior princess darling. I flirted with no one else. No one. I romanced her and her alone.

BUT.

For those not in the know, Dorian is a character in DAI. His thing is that he's gay from a homophobic country, and his dad tried to conversion therapy him via magic. You go take him to meet his dad, since he showed up looking for Dorian. Dorian spells it out for you that he's gay, since while its kind of obvious, he keeps it hush due to. Well. His experiences.

You have the option to tell Dorian you've been with the same gender yourself. It's marked as flirty if you're a guy, not sure if its the same as a woman. But for a male character, this is flirting with Dorian.

Later, when you talk to Dorian back at home base, you have some options to comfort him, because obviously he's kind of upset. One of these options, I knew to be saying you actually think better of him, and think he's been very brave. I picked this the first playthrough, because I felt it was more genuine and kind.

Second playthrough, I also picked the "I'm gay too" option from earlier.

When I picked the "I think better of you option" back at base...

I'd flirted only with Cassandra. I was dating her.

And my guy and Dorian started sucking face in the corner of a library.

NEVER FLIRTED WITH HIM BEFORE. All I did was say I was also gay, and then I said I thought he was strong for going through the shit he did. Thing is, you can romance Dorian immediately following the end of that quest. So, I tested something. We just made out for like, five minutes. Wanna date? "Aren't you with Cassandra?"

So, the issue here with DAI is that it doesn't always account for...oddities. For example, The Iron Bull will flirt with you hardcore if you flirt with him, but you try to pursue him while in a relationship, he won't. He'll tell you you have great tits and that he likes being pegged, all while making suggestive faces, but the moment those birds come to roost, he's out. What? Why not? Josephine would totally be down to clown with two beefy Qunari men, Bull would be down to clown with Josie! Why is this here???

Again. Games are really hard to program. And that's after you've written all the actual story.

For DAI, I can think of three romances that would be down for poly. So, you don't have much to do there. But there's still other things you need to account for. You can't acknowledge one thing, and ignore the others. If I threesome with Sera and Josie, what happens if I try throwing Bull into the mix? What happens if I break up with Sera? What happens if we ditch Josie, and add Bull, when Sera is a lesbian? Get the issue? Relationships are fucking complicated. Especially when you're the asshole having to puppeteer them in every possible direction, in the name of player freedom.

In the other direction, we have Stardew Valley. I compare it to a child's xylophone toy with utmost affection, its very plinky-plonky in nature.

SDV works on a heart system. 8 hearts with a bachelor or bachelorette, you can offer them a bouquet and start dating. At 10 hearts, you can propose and get married.

If you marry someone, you can date as many other people as you like. You might get a cutscene where your spouse is jealous that you're giving someone else presents, but they don't actually acknowledge that you have a side piece or two. And this jealous cutscene only plays with...a side piece of the same gender as the spouse. So, the character Shane doesn't care if you and Emily had sex in the woods, but God Forbid you give Elliot a duck feather.

HOWEVER. If you reach 10 hearts with all romance options of one gender (meaning you reach 10 with all of the boys, or 10 with all the girls), you get a cutscene where all of the boys or girls confront you with your cheating, and they're all pissed at you for, like, a week in game.

HOWEVER HOWEVER, you can skip this by carrying a lucky rabbit's foot in your inventory. If you have the foot, the cutscenes just play as you hanging out. So, the boys, rather than confronting you, just have a friendly game of pool, and the girls will just chat, I think. So, the only real acknowledgement that you have multiple partners can be skipped.

On the flip side, there's Skyrim. There is no flirting in skyrim, at all. You wear a necklace, and if the person is available, they'll comment on the necklace. You get married, and then you can never divorce your spouse, or get a new one. It's the game equivalent to church kids getting married right out of high school and sticking with it.

The only game I've ever seen handle this, and handle it well, is Hades.

Hades Supergiant my beloved.

In Hades, you play as Zagreus, the son of Hades trying to escape the underworld, because Hades got full custody in the divorce and Zag wants to see his mom on weekends. I kid but that's literally the plot.

Zagreus used to be dating the fury, Megaera, who also works for Hades as an enforcer and guard. She kills Zagreus in his escape attempts. Their relationship ended poorly, and its heavily implied to be because of Zagreus being a shithead to her. She's pissed at Zag, but with enough time and Zag making amends and apologizing, she is more than willing to be friends again.

Then we have Thanatos, the god of Death. He's always busy, and you never hear of him until a certain point in the game. It takes a long time for him to show himself. When he does, it's with a ringing bell, and the area turns green with his presence. He and Zag have a much more complicated relationship, as they've both carried a flame for each other, and never acted on it. Thanatos will appear to help Zag kill enemies before he starts showing at the hub world.

Finally, we have Dusa. Dusa is a floating gorgon head. You know Medusa? Cut off her head. That is Dusa, as her own entity. She's the shy, skittish, workaholic maid for the house of Hades (the hubworld) and has an obvious crush on Zagreus, day one. Whenever you talk to her, heart effects appear, and she quickly flees. She's attracted to Zag, but she's so skittish, building a relationship with her is more like trying to make a stray cat accept pets and treats. She's down, but she needs to get comfy around Zag, not feel so shy.

You can romance all three of these people! If you romance Thanatos and Meg, they'll show up in your bedroom, and you have a brief conversation about how this relationship will work, and if you're down, all three of you hook up. Then, for the rest of the game, you have a boyfriend and girlfriend! As for Dusa, they know about her, too, and she knows about them. Dusa just can't or doesn't want to have sex, so she's more of Zagreus's platonic partner. It's hard to explain. They don't have sex because Dusa isn't into it. It's very cute and sweet.

But the point is, Than, Meg, and Dusa will get together and figure out what they want, then approach Zagreus and see what he wants, and they all work it out from there. This is possible because there are so few romance options, and the writers accounted for people wanting all three. That's actually the intended path! But either way, Supergiant considered how romance would work and function in the setting they built, and how their characters would react and adapt.

Since they were working with a small number of characters, they could easily slot in different paths and choices. You can turn down Than, Meg, and Dusa. Turn down two of them. Accept all of them! And by having characters that like each other, you don't have to worry about Person B looking at Person C and gagging at the idea of sharing Person A.

The problem with romances in video games is that, if the game isn't, specifically, about the romances, you're not going to get a fully-realized experience. Hades has two gameplay modes; the escape attempts with the combat, and the visual novel side of the game with the developing relationships with all of the characters, romances or not. Hades very much puts both things in the spotlight—and it gets away with it, because Zagreus is a fully-realized character, who is not customizable and has no player input. Zagrues decides things on his own, not because a player pushed a button to accept a quest. You don't get to puppet him around. You get very few choices in dialogue with Zagreus.

Most games with romances, you play as a customizable character, who can be anyone, and do anything. The game devs have to account for that. To account for that, everything has to be squishy, and maliable, and that means that nothing really...matters. It can't! If you put too much importance on something, but the player has x amount of freedom, there's a chance they could miss it, or break it, or do something to render it moot. In Mass Effect 2, I believe, you have the choice to save the space government. If you let them gov die, in the next game, the new government is just...the old one in different suits. Letting the gov die is a big fucking deal, but because you made it a choice, you can't expend too much time and effort on realizing the consequences. Because you also need the timeline where the gov was saved. Why would you put so much time into an optional thing, when its possible most players will choose to do the intended path of saving the space gov?

Well, its the same for romances. Why put so much time into paths and consequences that some people won't see? Why would you write discussions of Sera wondering why you thought she'd have sex with Bull, a man, when most people aren't going to do that? Why would you write 144+ reactions to you cheating on all of the fallout 4 companions?

Writing is both very easy, and very hard. Getting ideas is easy. Working out the kinks in those ideas is hard as shit. Add a deadline, a budget, and lots of investors waiting expectantly, and lots of shit gets chucked on the cutting room floor.

#fallout 4 #fo4

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vatnalilja · 11 months

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Leave Your Body and Soul to Me | Hanamaru

In the midst of the rainy season, you and Hanamaru find a bit of refuge from the downpour in each other's arms.

It's just short fluff for the mansions #1 ダンディ! 1,145 words. No smut.

I wrote this with a feminine reader in mind, but it is gender-neutral. POV 2nd person, present tense

After your long, warm bath, you collapse in bed and stare at the dreary gray on the other side of the windows. The rainy season has come to the mansion and has had various effects on the inhabitants. Though stuck indoors, you enjoy the soft pitapat of raindrops on the glass panes and the flickering candlelight's cozy mood. You bunch a pillow under your chin and watch streaks of water trail down the window until your door creaks open behind you. You glance at your visitor, discovering Hanamaru holding two steaming teacups as he lets himself in.

"My Lord, I have some tea."

He pushes the door shut with his heel, then brings the cups to your bed with a shrewd look. Though he only brings you tea, he makes the act seem inappropriately decadent. You sit up with a smile, take a cup from him, and warm your hands on the ceramic. Without asking for permission, he sits on your bed and yawns.

"The rain has a way of making tasks difficult, doesn't it?" he asks.

"You're saying the rain makes you even lazier?" you ask.

"Perhaps, but I think the Lord might like to lie around as much as I do," he says.

You sip your tea. "It's true I've been feeling a little down lately."

"I wasn't judging you. I was merely observing that our interests . . . align."

"I haven't forgotten about what you said, you know."

He lifts his brow. "Oh, really?"

"About being the one to warm my bed. I can't believe you just said that out loud. In front of everyone."

He laughs in a way that conveys he has no regret over how he acted. It never truly bothered you; besides, he only articulated the desires of every man in the house. Crudely, but honestly. Perhaps that's why no one yelled at him.

"My Lord never objected," he says.

"Hanamaru."

"Days like today are meant for climbing under the covers and relaxing, don't you think?"

"And you'd be the perfect company for it?" you ask.

"Your words, Lord, not mine."

You tut your tongue and set your teacup on the nightstand. It's unclear why he developed such an instant affinity for you. He claimed to have a rude personality, but upon meeting, you felt no distance from him—a distinct difference from almost every other man in the mansion, most of whom took their time warming up to you. Perhaps the reason was that for the past several years, his only company had been children.

You crawl beneath your duvet and flip it over you until you disappear. After several moments, you feel his weight shift on your bed as he inches closer to its head. When he's at your side, you draw the bedding back and give him a grin devious enough to make him pause.

"What are you doing, Hanamaru?" you ask.

"Checking on my Lord," he says.

"Just doing your duties, then."

"Absolutely." He slips his hand under the duvet, and when you don't stop him, most of him follows, forcing you to the center of the bed. "Should I get comfortable?"

"Only if you want to stay," you say.

"How long will you be in bed?"

"If you're wondering whether you ought to get your sake—"

"I am."

"Then hurry and fetch it."

Pleased by your response, he stands and backs out of the room with a lopsided smirk. You occupy yourself with a book from the library while you wait for him to return, and when he does, he's barefoot and missing his tailcoat. His hair is wet, and he's holding a large bottle and two small cups, all proof of his run between the house and the villa.

"Where did your things go?" you ask with a laugh.

"I left them at the front door—they'd yell at me if I tracked water all through the mansion," he says.

He sets the sake down next to you, then turns away and shakes the water from his unruly hair. You're already pouring two cups when he lands heavily on your bed, causing you to splatter several drops.

"O~to, careful with that." He takes the bottle and finishes pouring for you.

"Maru, are you allergic to buttoning your shirt up the entire way?" you ask.

"It's a lot of work, isn't it?" He hands you a cup.

"No, it's not."

You savor the flavor of the sake. It's much nicer than you expected, with a crisp taste of apples. It was meant to be enjoyed, not hammered at until drunk. You weren't sure what he'd bring, but it defied your expectations.

"Maybe I should take it off so I don't get your sheets wet." He works the bottom buttons free and lets the front of his shirt fall open to reveal the rest of his well-defined chest.

You finish your drink and reach out to set the cup next to the bottle, letting your arm brush against his bare abdomen. After peeling his shirt from his body, he drops it to the floor, then slides under the covers again. He brings a comfortable warmth with him. When you cozy up to his side, he curls his arm under your waist and tugs you into his side.

"Maru . . . "

He hums in response.

"You may be unsophisticated—your words, not mine—but you're a good man."

"Oh? What did I do to deserve such praise from the Lord?" he asks.

You huff and poke him square in the chest. "Just accept my compliment."

"Ah, cute." He snags your finger in his hand and squeezes it beneath the duvet. "Which is exactly why I want to protect you."

You try tugging your hand away as your ears burn, but it's useless. Instead, you push as much of your face into your pillow as possible, refusing to look at him. He chuckles as he moves his grasp to your wrist and shakes your arm.

"Come on, now. Show me your face. When you do that, I can't see the Lord's shy face very well, now can I?"

"I'm not being shy," you mumble into your pillow.

"Then what is it?"

"I'm being annoyed."

"In that case, I like it even more."

He takes a deep breath, closes his eyes, and lets his weight sink into your bed as he rests your hand on his chest. You lift your head and watch him for several seconds, studying his facial features. Breathing a soft sigh through your nose, you rest your chin on his shoulder, then let your eyes flutter shut. Before long, the soothing sound of the rain lulls you into a peaceful state. His heart taps a slow, gentle rhythm beneath your palm that blends with the patter of the droplets on the window.

"I wish this could last forever," he whispers.

Though you say nothing, you agree.

#devil butler with black cat fanfic #akuneko #devil butler with black cat #akuneko fanfic #Kawakami Hanamaru #Kawakami Hanamaru x Reader #reader insert #second person pov #2nd person pov #x you #Kawakami Hanamaru x you #x gender neutral reader #gender neutral reader

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calamitaswrath · 1 year

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Man, I have to say though, as much as I ended up enjoying Future Redeemed (and honestly also Xenoblade Chronicles 3 as a whole package), it's just becoming more and more clear to me that what I actually enjoyed about Xenoblade Chronicles - as in, the first game - are just aspects of it that Monolith Soft and Takahashi really don't seem to consider to be important to their vision of the franchise.

Like, while one of the most frequent complaints that I have seen about Xenoblade 1 is the sheer number sidequests, I never really saw that as a negative. Sure, there a whole bunch of really rather basic quests, but I didn't have too much of an issue with those, as they are easy enough to complete, and the bits of flavour text you get with them give some insights as to how the people of Bionis and Mechonis and Mechonis interact with a given type of monster, material or collectible. And the quests given by named NPCs I think are just downright great, because while plenty of them start simple, the absolute vast majority of them are only parts of longer chains, that all establish complex relationships between NPCs in not just a specific area, but across multiple areas all over the world. The NPCs in this game feel like genuine people that you can get to know, and with the branching quest system, like someone you can actually have an actual impact on.

Games like X and 3 of course also have an Affinity Chart, but I think that by the very nature of their story premises, these games both don't really have the same kind of grounded feel to it that 1 has. In both games, you can't really get the sense that you are getting to know someone who is just living their life normally because they either already survived the destruction of their home planet (in X) or have a fundamentally abstract way and understanding of life that I find harder to relate to (3, which honestly even applies to people in the City). In 1, by contrast, there's of course the entire war against the Mechon, but even with that, the way in which it affects people comes off as more of a disruption to everyday life of these people, rather than something that is fundamental to their entire being as you get to know them. There's a reason why the fate of Alcamoth after Mechonis Core hits so hard, and why I find it difficult to even care for what happens to Indol and anyone on it towards the end of 2. Anyway, also doesn't help that in X and 3 I find it fundamentally more difficult to actually keep track of the Affinity Chart because there isn't really a good way to view it in its entirety or anything that's designated as a proper "middle point" for it.

Either way, this whole grounded appeal also manifests itself in the party for me. Admittedly, when you just judge them by the main story, the only real characters that truly receive proper development are Shulk and Melia (and sort of Dunban), but I think their backgrounds (as well as the Heart-to-Hearts focussed on one particular dynamic) do a whole lot of work in still making them work. All four characters from Colony 9 have their childhood friend dynamic that gets explored in Heart-to-Hearts, and the people in the colony actually know them and acknowledge them. Sharla likewise only really has the refugees from Colony 6, but she does have a similar dynamic to them. Riki of course got his family, and also gets some interactions with the Nopon of Frontier Village. And the only character that isn't really grounded, Melia, is acknowledged to be a bit out there in comparison to the others, but gets integrated nonetheless. Contrast that with the party in 2, where outside of Driver and Blade relationships, no one really knows each other before the start of the game, and Rex explicitly hasn't been in his actual hometown for a literal third of his life, the other party members are either royalty, beings with an inherently different way of life from humans, or Tora, and everyone either has these over-the-top personalities or backstories. . . even if I didn't have all of my other issues with 2, I don't think I ever could really get attached to the party there the same way as I do in 1. And while I think the party in 3 is better about this, there's still the fundamental issue of the core concept behind their lifespans and how it affects them making them just inherently a bit more difficult to relate to, even if the childhood friend dynamic between Noah, Lanz and Eunie is appreciated. X meanwhile doesn't even really have a party dynamic for the vast majority of its main story mission runtime, which admittedly just isn't what the game is going for, but I still kinda miss whenever I review the cutscenes of the final chapter where that sort of thing does briefly pop up.

And even beyond that, 1 just has all these little things that flesh out its setting, like proper descriptions for both materials and collectibles (with everything in the strange category even being explicitly named by party members, which is just such a nice little touch!), which for some reason no other game in the series actually has?? Like, I can understand it for 2, since that game had a somewhat rushed development with limited staff to make it come out in the Switch's first year, but 3 still doesn't have either of that, and X only ever had descriptions for collectibles, but not materials.

Of course, at the end of the day, Xenoblade 1 still has many similarities to the other games - even if the story is more grounded in my eyes, it still goes for an over-the-top shonen anime style very often. But it feels like the other games leaned into that way more, at the expense of everything else that made 1 what it was. Idk, there's just a reason why Majora's Mask is one of my favourite Zelda games, if not my absolute favourite. I just like getting the feeling of having a video game world where the people in it could conceivably live there and feel real, even if none of them are particularly deep. I don't doubt that I'll enjoy future Xenoblade games if 3 is any indication, but unless Monolith Soft seriously rethink their approach to them, I don't think I'll ever love one in the same way as I do 1.

#xenoblade #xenoblade chronicles #xenoblade chronicles 1 #xenoblade 1 #xc #xc1 #xcde #xbcde #shut up cal you fool #long post #I think the only game in the franchise that got close to capturing that appeal was torna #and even then it didn't *quite* get there for several reasons #anyway I don't think I put any of this particularly well #but idk maybe someone will agree

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mihai-florescu · 4 months

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Regarding the five star four star and 2 three stars for each unit thing they tend to do my biggest wish is for himeru/kohaku and tatsumi/mayoi centre. Idk how to explain it but hiiro and rinne were the focus of the main story and aira and niki felt like they got a bit of character from that too (more than their other 2 members at least) so this just kinda feels. Right? I've seen people theorise that they'll address kaname or that he'll wake up and I don't doubt that logic, I just hope if so kohaku and mayoi can be of some significance. I think kohaku and mayoi are decent to bring attention to because despite himeru trying to be distant at first I think he definitely is most fond of kohaku, and don't ask me about tatsumi and mayoi you're talking to a ttmy shipper I'll be here all day. Basically I just think if himeru and tatsumi were to go through the horrors their unit mates would be there for them but those two in particular somewhat understand them a bit better. Before anyone tells me these 4 were in the romantic date scout I know. I've simply decided to remove it from my memory because I could never hate a story more than that one.

I've just ranted about alkakurei to you now. It's good to be back I guess

Im hoping for niki to have a really big moment in the tour personally, as well as aira, in a different light than what we've seen so far. I just...wish i cared more for them than i really do. And I wish i could make myself care, but alas, i can live with it just fine actually. The card distribution, well, im trying to keep track of when they've had cards last already/who's still due. Tatsumi still needs a ts2 so im counting him out of the possible tour 5stars (could be a 4star), but everyone else i think is eligible from that perspective. Oh......ohhhh.....it just came to mind, but you know how they did the altered and graduation tours? Tatsumi's ts2 could totally be running during the alkakurei tour, and be related to the story in that manner. Im willing to bet on this actually, nevermind, he's definitely getting a tour 5star in the gacha. And kohaku getting his fs2 then as well would be so cruel...higgles. rip alkakureiPs. Himemayo tour 5stars sounds plausible. But so does amagi bros to parallel their main story 5stars, or any other combination... idkidk im going to stop speculating until we have more information. Um. Checkmate anime is coming out first and i will be focusing my attention and obsession there, sorry. My knightspilled checkmateholic eichip swag.

Im not sure if you meant you actually hate romantic date /srs or if it was said in a "omg i hate x thing its gonna be the only thing i think about for days" way. I feel like you meant it /srs but im personally a fan of the story poking fun at fandom behavior, giving into and critiquing at the same time, as well as the insights into himeru's psyche. The game with affinity points from the other characters is just in himeru's head and a manifestation of his subconscious, where he thinks no one's love for him can grow as he doesnt let them actually know Him, the person beyond the himeru persona. Only tatsumi who loves everyone could still love him. And thats also pissing him off.

They both approach and view things, relationships, motivation etc so differently, a lot of himeru's internal monologues are filled with "negative" feelings (jealousy, pride, paranoia etc. Even the earliest we know of him is that he ran away from home because his dad remarried and he couldnt accept it, he's been like this forever. And yet, these feelings arent fitting with the perfect ido persona, so he bottles them up, with the occasional slip ups. Himeru's presence and slow opening up in crazy:b of all units, the group driven by their feelings and desires, is so so important to me.) whereas tatsumi just...has so much love and acceptance (although as much as they're an important part of his character, it's just as important that he also has his own wishes and desires and he does act on them, moreso than himeru at least. Like his hobby of driving recklessly, which he doesnt do because he cant drive well, but because he wants to do it like that and to experience the fun even if it's unconventional or incomprehensible to others). And this gap in their mentalities and approaches to life is scary for himeru. It's a hundred times harder to love and save another than to hate or break someone down (paraphrasing from another enstars quote lmao), i can empathize with himeru having complicated feelings about tatsumi's character that he doesnt understand himself, so he defaults to calling him unpleasant rather than having to unpack it. Let aside that beyond the difference in approaches they also have a complicated past, it's easier to just blame tatsumi who can take it seemingly unscathed. I think romantic date is fun to read both before and after having experienced obbligato...especially moreso after, when youre aware of the foreshadowing and further developments (this has been my experience with most of akira's gacha stories he's written in es2 era)

Im not a tthm shipper in the traditional sense of "i want to see them date" cuz i think what they have going on is much more fascinating and nuanced than that and it'd do the relationship a disservice imo. I was gonna say it's also fun to put these characters who struggle with understanding each other and actual romance and love in general actually in every sense of the word together but thats kind of the entire cast. A lot of my favorite dynamics at least, that have had varying degrees of success and development. However, it is something i enjoy, obviously, so i will always remain fond of romantic date...wah i rambled about this for a very long time, i'll stop now!

#ask #niicookie

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clovecardamom · 9 months

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i really didn't like barbara (2023) but i think the thing making me feel most bonkers is the idea that ken goes outside like this in public:

and all he can remark upon is how respected, cool, and powerful he feels. how everyone likes him, and respects him, and it's nothing at all like how people look at him in barbieland. that he feels, specifically, no violent intentions towards him, while barbie is grappling with the concept of the male gaze for the first time.

and this was a problem for me, and it haunted me for the rest of the movie. because do you know what it actually feels like to be man dressed in public like this? to put on your funny little cowboy outfit and romp around with your gal pal?

you're not nodding to a bro finishing his set at the gym. you're not getting fist bumps and handshakes from random men on the street. you are getting called slurs.

you are getting literally nothing but barely contained homophobic contempt from men who immediately clock you as a gross, weird, queer freak. this is a one way ticket to being called the gay slur of the day, and the movie just sort of hopes you forget homophobia exists and how men enact homophobia onto each other constantly.

i don't know how this happened, but it remains a glaring issue for the rest of the movie. the ken characters dressing in sexual, hyper-masculine archetypes of cowboys and every imaginable type of jock is supposed to be a joke about guys being dudes and how ken dolls used to dress but it just... loops back around to feeling pointedly homophobic, when these are aesthetics that have been 100% adopted by gay men?

like, any salient conversation about the patriarchy doesn't function when your toxic alpha males are dressed to go to a circuit party. this is what i wore to pride.

as a man who does dress like this pretty often, and loves to go to the gym dressed like this to work out and feel sexy and confident... it felt really bad? and really mean for no reason? like, these are aesthetics that gay men adopted because we like being men, and we like playing these male archetypes to such campy extremes precisely because straight men stop finding it appealing and it lets us enjoy all of the fun parts of male identity we didn't get to enjoy when male spaces were toxic cesspools of homophobia that pushed us out.

i accept the possibility that i am being dramatic, but i think it is an issue for me that barbara (2023) thinks its funny and absurd for men to dress like this, and plays the visual of it it so often for comedy while the boys wrestle and grab and tease each other that it begins to make me feel really unwelcome.

making fun of guys being dudes so much that you accidentally become homophobic is not new! and i always hate it! but in this instance, it did really did make me, a doll collector and barbie fan who is also a gay man? a gay man who really loves and has a deep affinity for the idea of being a wonderful supportive ken to all of the wonderful barbies in my life? who also dresses in slutty little neon gym shorts sometimes because it makes him feel confident and sexy in a form of masculinity that has been queered into something empowering?

it made me feel really gross. i did not like it at all.

also i hated allan.

#barbie #i love yelling on tumblr dot com #it's so much fun to yell here

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citylawns · 2 months

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Would you ever consider leaving London? I moved from London to Margate in Kent and I can’t believe how much better my quality of life is. I can afford my rent, and even have a small garden, I spend much more time outside etc. it was really difficult for me to come to terms with the prospect of leaving London, but now I wish I had left earlier. I love this blog and relate so much to so many of your posts! Take care of yourself! ❤️

Yes, but if I had the opportunity of moving I wouldn't want to stay in this country! Also the only things I like about this country (my friends, my history, places I love, the creative communities, job opportunities) are in London so I'm trapped here for now haha. I loved Dory's in Margate! It's such a cute place and I'm glad you realised that about London, it's really not for everyone and I have known quite a few people to leave. I hate when people talk shit about this city though, like when they say there's no community here or that its only rich people etc. I have such a different experience of the city.

Personally, I need a city to live in. I don't really find I need a garden or loads of time in nature to be happy (nature to me is parks and pavements lol), and the issue of rent is something I think needs to be controlled in cities because working class people need a decent quality of life here, and people deserve to not have their communities uprooted. Gentrification has been killing every working class London neighbourhood. I see how moving out of London is a practical, but I would never leave here voluntarily. If I was, like many people are, forced to leave London because of rent prices I would be absolutely devastated. I get why people see moving out of the city as a viable option for happiness, but so many of us have homes and lives and communities here, that the solution to high rent cant be destroying our lives! That's what the Conservative government wants, the neoliberal attitude introduced by Margaret Thatcher has been devastating us for decades and I always feel anger when people (not you, but others) have said to me "just leave London" like the city is the problem - I've never once said I was unhappy in this city or that it was part of my struggles, people have always inferred/projected that - instead of the way the country is being governed or that its the individuals responsibility to change and upheave their lives.

But yeah, no cities are cheap and London has always been my home. I guess that's it, that I can't really comprehend moving because I feel at home? Not everyone feels such an affinity with where they are born, but I do. I think if I had been born elsewhere I'd come here. I wonder if the 10 years I was away not living in London that were the worst years of my life made me long for it more. I'd love to live in New York, Paris, San Francisco, Hanoi, Tokyo, etc but that's not on the cards for me. Never say never and I hope my prospects change radically in the next few years lol, but those are the only places I am drawn to. I have considered Toronto because it's got a music scene, but having spoken to friends in bands from that scene its not anything to move for. I just know my world and life would collapse if I left everything I've worked so hard to build for myself here, all the roots I've got here. If I was just interested in writing and didn't socialise or have any aspirations in fashion, photography or music I actually think I'd still be in a city.

I love being able to leave my flat and walk to 3 or 4 different independent bookshops and the most amazing secondhand bookshops. I love that I can be in the same city but feel in an entirely different place and still get home in the evening. I love feeling loyal to the area of London I've spent so many years in. I love all the different food and cuisines I can get here. I love all the different people and cultures I can meet. I hated being away from multiculturalism when I lived in a British seaside town. Maybe one day London will feel too small to me, it's definitely possible because I've spent almost 20 years here, but hopefully if and when that happens I'll be in a position to move to another country. I think if I left, in some ways it would just be a way of prolonging coming back. So ultimately, if I was able to yes I'd move to a different city but for the experience because I choose to sacrifice financial security for pursuing a creative metropolitan lifestyle (which has got harder because of David Cameron, George Osborne, Theresa May and Rishi Sunak etc), but London is always going to be my home.

#ask

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violetsareblue-selfships · 1 month

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Hi April!! ^-^/🎫 <- is for you

~ @botanists-little-cookie

Okay, I've held onto this for a while but I'm gonna finally gush about Zayne hehe :3 I honestly don't even know where to start since my brain's usually just !!! a lot when I think about him.

Like everyone usually sees him as cold or stoic, but he has such a teasing, playful side too. It's a lot more subtle (and honestly kind of sarcastic) but it's there. And he seems to go along with a lot of the mc's antics if they're harmless (like the mc told him to talk to a plushie and he did and in the secret fairytale card they had like a little roleplay session lol) -- and also teasing her for thinking that he mostly hung out at museums by bringing it up again playfully and all that

But he's like the sweetest ever?? All super gentlemanly and caring and just <333 (like I don't have it unlocked yet bc it requires affinity level 70 but there's something of him helping the mc with dealing with her period cramps and whatnot and he's so caring about it and <333)

It's so obvious (to me at least) just how much he cares about me (gonna start saying that instead of the mc bc my s/I is technically not her) but like helping me fall asleep, taking care of me if I'm ever feeling sick or stressed out just <333 he'd also be the type to do good morning/goodnight texts if he's able (aka not in surgery at the time) especially if he knows that I like it

(exhibit a :3)

(exhibit b ^^)

Also the way he works me into his schedule - like with the new memory and all that "when would we be able to meet up again" and he literally pulls his phone out that second to check his schedule and say that he's free next Sunday - like he's so eager to see me again and it's just the cutest (also that last line before the kiss scene kills me - "if I'm able to see you Sunday, I'll start getting excited Thursday." like aaaaaa that's so cute

(like look he literally pulled the phone out so quick to check his schedule <3)

And his voice is so soft and lovely when it comes to me (not to say I don't like the cooler, more stoic tone either but the softer whispers kill me) and I love that you can save your favorite lines to relisten to bc I have so many that are literally because of how soft he is or because he's laughing in the audio and it's butterflies every time <333

Also he's so pretty like it's unfair at times. I have so many screenshots of this man bc I just can't help it and he makes me feral I swear (like the medical rescue memory all I could think about was biting him like help me) and I seriously get so giggly and giddy over him, it's silly (he'd find it cute though… hehe)

Might do a picture dump just because!!

Like aaaa!!! he's so pretty!!!

(to the left - the medical rescue one i mentioned aka i wanna bite him | to the right - the new card absolutely KO-ing me with this!!!)

And like I didn't touch on the Myths stuff (the Foreseer thing) but that lore is so angsty and everything - it honestly will deserve its own post once I get all the cards necessary to go through the entire thing - all I know is I'm going to think of it every time I think about jasmines and all that

Anyways I think it's evident I just adore him so yeah :D And i give you a cookie if you read all of that hehe

#self shipping #self ship #f/o gush #thanks for the ask!#under the aurora's glow 💖🩺#fate🦉

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unohanadaydreams · 2 years

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This might be controversial, but I always thought Neliel should have died killing Nnoitra. Two incompatible philosophies destroying each other. Because the thing is, Neliel is the anomaly in terms of Hollows, she's extremely un-arrancar like even when you compare her to the more rational Espada like Starrk and Halibel and there's never been an explanation for why. I think part of Nnoitra's hatred for her is because her worldview is so alien and incomprehensible coming from a Hollow. (1)

Nnoitra's attitude towards Nel and how she kept sparing his life after defeating him reminds me a lot of Loly and Menoly's reaction when Orihime healed them after Grimmjow mauled them. They thought she was looking down on them and she's like a "monster" because they don't understand empathy. I'm biased because I really don't like Nel but I do think her dying to kill the person she always underestimated would have been a better conclusion to their respective arcs than her being comic relief. (2)

Ooooh, I like these thoughts.

I think part of the 'why' for Nel is that she took Aizen's spiel of building a rational, peaceful society to rival the shinigami seriously. And what's more, she seems to believe that society is going to take precedent over the arrancar being used en masse to stall the Shinigami.

Its obvious she feels that the lives of the arrancar will further be enriched and that combat with Soul Society will be defensive in nature. She prioritizes a meal with her lovable oafs over fighting because she genuinely believes that's the kind of world that's being built. She spares Nnoitra because killing anyone who loses to you isn't how you build.

Nel wants everyone to stand on equal footing, even if their ranks separate them, and that's what Aizen promises her. And as we know; Aizen fucking lied.

All that said, you're right--she doesn't make sense in Hueco Mundo. Nel's desperate attempt to survive by reverting into a child still doesn't affect Nnoitra's world view. Our protagonists assume her appearance kept her safe but if you look at all the games she mentions, they seem like excuses to stay on the run, don't they?

Her reverting into a child really does not make sense at all for how Hueco Mundo operates. No one fucking cares that she's a kid. They'll still kill her because it'll give them power or simply because it's something to do. It seems entirely for the benefit of Ichigo, who has a great affinity for protecting children and is definitely affected far more by Nnoitra beating the shit out of some toddler than he would've been by a grown woman who he probably wouldn't have carried along to that point to begin with!

Which is a definite weakness for how Nel is set up. The flaw with Nel is that she is supposed to be our sympathetic arrancar, who introduces us to Hueco Mundo. And it doesn't work near as well as Rukia being the introduction to Shinigami. (And personally, I find her as a toddler and her fraccion so fucking annoying.)

You can really feel Kubo trying to compress all his intentions for Nel into that one fight and it works in a sense but it doesn't land all the way. Because Nel is still turning into a baby and we just don't have time to spend with Nel like we did Rukia.

I also think Nnoitra and Nel killing each other is not a bad idea, at all.

Nnoitra would have been killed by the one person he has been clawing at to do so, presumably since he became an arrancar, and mostly likely would realize that in the end, it's not actually what he wanted. WE know that's not what he really wanted. But it's clear HE doesn't--he really, truly hates Nel for making him live in his failure to beat her over and over again. He would feel empty, regretful, and understand what he wanted was the power to fight as her equal all along.

And, for Nel it would be even more tragic. Not only would killing Nnoitra be something she'd avoided (for idk? is it years or months? or weeks??? the arrancar timeline is so fucky. they all act like they've been in motion for years.), and dying by his hand would show that on some level they were equals and instead of living together in understanding, they were doing what hollows always did---fighting to the death to satisfy their point. Which is what she was trying to build away from.

In canon, we did at least get Nel watching Nnoitra die, as Nnoitra seemed to very much wants after he insisted Kenpachi finish him off. But even if Nel lived, which I wouldn't mind, I think Nnoitra should have lived or died by her hand. Because, there really was no reason for her to be so devalued in power. (tbh imagine the absolute power move of Nel choosing to let him live, even. would not be enough copium in the stratosphere for that man)

ALSO, yes, I absolutely agree on the comparison to Nnoitra and Loly. They genuinely do not understand why their violence is being responded to with grace and compassion. And the implications that grace and compassion exists is terrifying if you are someone who has justified not just your actions but all actions against you as 'just the way things are'.

It means when you suffered, there was always a chance someone could have shown you compassion. You could have stayed your own hand. You have to look at yourself and realize that you're wrong. And others are wrong. And 'the way things are' is wrong. It's easier to pretend the compassionate party is really doing it to hold sway over and harm Aizen or hang you out to dry and shame you in front of Tesla and all the other arrancar. To abstain from harming someone back and to firmly show someone their own harm was a CHOICE, is the greatest harm in Nnoitra & Loly's eyes.

All in all, this was a very interesting line of thought and I think it's a shame it would be considered controversial. Nel and Nnoitra are narratively stuck to the hip so it's not like the idea of them dying together is coming out of no where.

#baby nel my beloathed #maybe if she and her fraccion didn't ruin the pacing and mood i'd like them more #but alas #at least Nel transforms into a good character at some point. Her fraccion don't have a saving grace #also Nnoitra is interesting thanks to Nel so imo it sucks that Nel is tossed aside and babified again mid fight #yes i loved seeing Kenpachi and that one spread where he shows up is GOLD #but STILL #literally so sad that the shinigami magically showing up to save the day in this arc and Fullbringer arc narratively sucks #bc they look so good doing it >:

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oreganosbaby · 2 years

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I still think a lot about Kendall and Roman's respective modes of repression and self-denial and the tough shell they've built around themselves to avoid being seen as soft, and yet how they still go in these different directions. I feel like maybe when they were little it was Kendall who was more uptight and obedient while Roman was the loudmouth troublemaker, and as they both got into their teens it kind of started to flip as Kendall started using and trying to form his own identity while Roman went through the grind at military school.

I get why some people might find a lot of parallels analysis excessive, but for me I just feel like I can understand the characters better individually if I can compare them to see how they're different.

I think it's hard to understand Succession without comparing the characters. They're all parts of a whole, even characters that seemingly don't have much of a relationship are comparable.

However, I will say that I don't really agree with the idea that Kendall and Roman's outward demeanors switched. I think they're natural facets of their respective personalities and make sense within that frame. To me, Roman's innate affinity for chaos and mischief isn't rooted in the same thing as Kendall's desire to individuate. At the same time, their respective obedience is needed to please their father, but the way they go about this is very different. Kendall needs to feel useful, so he tends to take more initiative and is always trying to rationally understand what Logan wants, while Roman is willing to do what his father asks of him. After a certain point, it becomes that Roman knows what he wants more intuitively. All these parts of them were always there and still are.

For Roman, when people are surprised or shocked, their reactions are honest. People in their world are seldom up-front with their emotions, so there's delight in drawing out that sort of candidness, especially when it's pushed to its extremes. It's nice to see that underneath it all, everyone has these messy (mostly negative) emotions that he has. For Kendall, that desire to individuate might be due to the contradictory goals of Logan's grooming. What I mean is that part of it probably did involve telling Kendall he was special and that as a businessman, it's important to be independent, all while kicking him down and tightening the leash. You are right though in pointing out that it would be harder to individuate while at military school. Wanting to form your own identity is a very common part of being a teenager, so Kendall got to go through a bit of that, while Roman's attempt at this was more stifled. The birth order matters here as well because rather than try to set himself apart from Logan, Roman seems more interested in setting himself apart from his siblings which makes sense because Kendall’s primal identification is with his father and Roman’s isn’t. We can see this in how Roman is significantly less outwardly emotional than Kendall. By understanding how Kendall’s mercurial nature creates issues between he and Logan, it’s likely he would try to temper his emotions so as to not take up too much space. This isn’t to say he’s really repressed them because he hasn’t and neither has Kendall. Kendall can’t help but let them out almost immediately, but Roman can suppress them until they just mix into the stew of general negative emotions that are always there. He gets annoyed, irritated and frustrated, but has very little rage and we’ve never seen him cry. This doesn’t save them from ever spilling out, though. I think what’s really important is understanding that neither Roman nor Kendall are able to really repress their emotions and that that’s part of why they’re seen as failures to their father. They can’t just bury them so deep they can delude themselves into thinking they don’t exist. They’re there, they know it, they feel it and they’re ashamed of it.

#myplasticadversary #succession meta #succ sesh #dalia writes #dalia replies

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the-grim-squeaker-8 · 1 year

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Would you like to tell me about your ocs

uhhhh what ocs. ive never had one of those in my life.

ok like in all honesty the last few months(?) have just been me fixating on a rotating series of indulgent throwaway characters and scenarios that feel like they change out every week but i suspect if i kept notes its actually probably like every other day. they entertain me while my interest holds, and if i don’t make Something™ out of each and every one of them, thats okay. Maybe a couple of them will eventually cycle back in and i’ll figure out something to do with them, idk.

That said I dug through the last yearish(?)’s worth of content I can remember to try and find anything reasonably interesting and/or shelf-stable:

Magicalgirlverse - one of the only things ive actually written for in a while. most of them are underdeveloped (ie. pending literally any development). I know there’s a hearts/love-themed magical girl, a flower magical girl, a sun moon stars trio, a wolf magical girl, and one whose original prompt was “godzilla”.

The problem is... I thought it would be fun to give one of them a monster boyfriend, and then I thought it would be sad if all his friends were dead or evil, so I added a second monster boyfriend, who is very angry with the first one, and then the drama between them hijacked the plot.

The magical girls will get to be the center of their own story. Eventually. I hope.

Characters I can reasonably describe in any detail so far:

Bright Angel Queen: hearts magical girl. Not quite an endless font of compassion, but she tries. Her real name is Hestia and yes she picked it.

Scythe: Monster boyfriend (sad). Used to be evil but defected out of love for Hestia. Has a very goth civiliansona (defaults to his true from in private, no i don't know what he looks like). Used to have four brothers and would literally rip his heart out of his chest to save the last of them.

Shadow: Monster boyfriend (angry). Used to be (?) evil but left because everyone he cared about was dead, abandoned him, or in Dark Glory’s case, in danger if they stayed. Would watch Scythe rip his heart out of his chest for his sake, and still spit in his face.

Dark Glory: wolf magical girl. Morally ambiguous. Solitary. Traumatized. Would die for Shadow (he would never allow it).

Princess Pixie Victory Screamer: an eight-year-old girl who wants nothing more than to be a T-rex when she grows up. Some people shorten her name to Pixie. Scythe shortens it to Screamer.

Ardanath – I waffled about whether to mention this one, both because of the subject matter and also because she’s only been around for like a week and I don’t know if she’ll stick, but by all metrics she’s the oc I’ve most recently been rotating in my mind, so.

Ardanath is a princess whose mother (a local morally ambiguous overlord) was murdered by a rival evil overlord, who then kidnapped Ardanath and made her marry him. Honestly, she wasnt supposed to be on this list; she was an npc in a solo ttrpg I played about one of her mother’s warriors (and Ardanath’s father) trying to save her and I was planning to move on from this scenario afterwards but then he failed, and DIED, and it was very upsetting, and I couldn’t just LEAVE her like that she deserves closure. And revenge.

It’s gonna be a rough next couple of years for her, but she will endure, reject her affinity for spring and fertility and instead become the avatar of autumn, death, and decay, murder a bunch of her children (i know she leaves at least one of them alive), resurrect her father as an undead thrall because he would be a loyal and reliable source of eternal servitude, get her revenge, and become an evil overlord in her own right, just like her parents always wanted her to be.

I don’t know if it would be pragmatic for her to make her husband suffer before he dies but I hope she gets to.

Wrath – this one is hard to explain because in helping a friend develop their oc I found my interpretation of the premise so compelling i stole her to make in my own image but since I stripped out all the lore and havent filled in anything new I don’t... know how she gets here.

I know she’s basically a rogue lab experiment (I don’t know who made her or why), named herself Wrath (I don’t know why she’s angry), and has some specific form of magic that erodes her sanity and sense of self if mismanaged (I don’t know what the magic actually does but it was mismanaged). One of the people who contributed to her creation is a wizard who had the same magic as her but he left the project ages ago, tbd to what extent his participation was voluntary and fully-informed, if he knows she exists and how she was treated, etc.

idk I just think it would be funny if she just randomly shows up in this guy's house, covered in blood and like 70% sane on a good day, and wants his help with this one thing and isnt interested in any deeper relationship, and this is how he finds out she exists.

They will eventually found family each other but she already has a found family and isn’t interested in being daughtered so it’s one-sided at first. She keeps disappearing for weeks or months at a time and he keeps trying to delicately ask where she goes (elsewhere) and what she’s doing (crime) and if anyone is looking out for her (other, equally dysfunctional escaped lab experiments) and whose blood is that anyway (hers, now) and she keeps getting bored with his concerns and wandering off to go kill someone. I love her.

#this took me like eight hours to write #i also have two dynasty sim solo ttrpg games i can talk about if anyone wants #but only on request because #the fantasy one is a bit of a saga to explain coherently #and the space emperor one is uhhhhh #whats your caligula tolerance #because literally everyone in this family tree. is a caligula #not even just the emperors their extended family #the drama. it was delicious

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odayaka1 · 7 months

Text

Chapter 6: Knowledge of Seals

[

STATUS UPDATE

CHAKRA QUANTITY : 5 TAILS

COMBAT POWER : 6 TAILS

9 TAILS WITH OCULAR POWERS

ABILITIES

TAILED BEAST BOMB – LVL MAX

• ANY SHAPE WITH ENOUGH STRUCTURAL BALANCE, CAN BE USED FOR THE BOMB. EVEN A FINGER SIZED BOMB CAN ERADICATE A MOUNTAIN ON DETONATION.

]

Wow I just threw some chakra bombs to pass my time and the level went up by so much that it maxed out.

I think it's due to my new control. The bomb now comes to me as easy as breathing.

Now I don't want to train in chakra control. I feel bored, so I started rolling my 150 meter body on the floor.

Lets train harem style shadow clones for a month as relaxation.

As I created a mountain full of clones turned into naked women and a notification came.

[

ABILITY UPDATE

HAREM STYLE SHADOW CLONES: LVL 9

• A SKILL FORMED BY A BORED FOX JUST TO KILL TIME AND STEAL SOMEONE ELSE GLORY.

• CAN BE USED FOR DIFFERENT APPLICATION DEPENDING ON USERS INTENTION.

• SKILL OF DEGENERATE PEOPLE.

]

'Oye-Oye! Don't go and say all those things like it's true. I mean I did steal it to mess with Naruto but I am not a degenerate.'

Why is it still a level 9 system ? What does it lack to reach level 10?'

[

NOTICE

ACCORDING TO THE TECHNIQUES IN DATABASE THERE IS ONLY REAL EXPERIENCE THAT IS REQUIRED WHICH HOST DOESN'T HAVE AS HOST HASN'T SEEN NAKED BODY INCH BY INCH TO HAVE AN PROPER UNDERSTANDING OF IT.

ONLY THE ORIGINAL CREATOR 'NARUTO UZUMAKI' REACHED LEVEL 10 IN THIS TECHNIQUE AFTER STAYING WITH JIRAIYA.

]

So Naruto was more of a degenerate than I thought. Well now back to training.

For the next five years I went on intense grind in which I took the topic I liked the most, the seals.

Seals are divided into several categories: Basic seals. This includes the same and more knowledge that Uzumaki have till advanced levels.

Like sealing chakra in things, affecting senses, gravitational seals.

There are many seals like sensory seals, chakra blocking seals, 4 element seals etc. These are all in beginners level.

In intermediate level. It comes to the knowledge of sealing living beings, making soul weapons.

The Death Reaper seal was also included in it. It is one of the most forbidden knowledge of Uzumaki. Now I know its variation without any price. I also have a counter for the same skill.

Cursed seals are also part of the course. Better than what pedomaru could even think of.

Seals for conscious or mind palace altering. I even got enough knowledge to make better seals of tailed beasts than them.

Advanced seals are way above the previous level. They consist of seals to slow time or increase it.

It can create teleportation channels amongst two seals with enough chakra provided.

Gravitational forces can be altered in larger planes or areas like a whole city.

I was able to learn how five elements or other elements are mixed to form Kekkei Genkai also known as bloodline limits like wood style and many more.

Just using seals and having enough element affinity which is no problem for me being a beast with all affinities.

I made seals with the knowledge and imprinted on my body which negates my weakness to wood style and also my tails sensitivity is now under control, yes even the ears.

These weren't shown on the system panel as it was not an ability but a seal.

[ABILITY UPDATE

SEALS – LVL 6

• ADVANCED LEVEL SEALS ACHIEVED

• ENTER THE UNDERSTANDING OF COMPLEX ELEMENTS LIKE TIME, SPACE, FORTUNE.]

I just scratched the surface of advanced seals as it is a vast topic.

After advanced seals there are forbidden seals which divulge information regarding the forbidden knowledge of the universe like altering fate, increasing luck without any consequences.

In the advanced version fortune requires equal exchange like for your lucky day everyone around you has a bad day.

These types of seals are usually affecting the flow of reality which one should not touch unless they have a proper grasp or understanding of their nature, they always have a chain effect on things like a time loop.

'Mess with reality and it messes with you, huh'

I will never use this seal. I made a seal to passively increase the quantity of chakra while maintaining the quality. It is very slow but I don't have to focus on it because it's automatic and I can focus on other things.

It will let me handle the other things on my plate as I leave the chakra to the seals. Creation of seals is only limited by your imagination. It is not just a set of action or pattern, it requires sequence and what outcome you desire from the seals.

Depending on your thinking process you can make the worst seal using the best knowledge and you can also create the best seal just using the basic knowledge.

#anime art #art #fanfic #novels #writing #naruto #naruto fanart #naruto art #naruto shippuden #naruto fanfic #naruto uzumaki #sasuke

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slocumjoe · 11 months

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If you were to rate the Fo4 companions from most to least favourite how would you rate them?

I can't list them in order, because I have too many feelings on them....and also, I love them all! It's just...there's such a Rollercoaster of quality of writing, of character concept, of VA performance, of actual attention and care given to the meat-and-potatoes aspects...

Like, I can say I have a favorite (Danse) and a least favorite (Piper) and a dude in the middle who I give not a crap about (Deacon), but I still like these characters??? They're fun! Its just, I like my idea of them more than what's actually there.

So, uhhhh

RORY TALKS ABOUT THE COMPANIONS 2 ELECTRIC BOOGALOO

this is basically a long-post of a bunch of mini-essays, so grab a snack or nice bev and get cozy

Cait, to me, is a prime example of "this character sounds better on paper". I've already complained about her three greatest flaws; being bloated, being mishandled, and being a very confused character. If I were to describe Cait, it would be that she's a troubled young woman who was traumatized all her life, but understands that it's effected her heavily and wants to work past it and better herself.

In game, she's...an Irish Girl. She talks about drinking and fucking and fighting. If not that, she's detailing her absolutely horrific life. It gives me tonal whiplash. I feel like they were too busy adding things on rather than fleshing her out. I mean, really...what is the significance of the Tough Irish Girl type in the wasteland, where everyone acts that way? Is Cait an example of your average wastelander, someone whos supposed to show the daily life in this world? Well...no, that can't be it, she's put away from others, an outsider who doesn't fit in whatever circumstances she finds herself in. She doesn't belong with raiders, she doesn't fit into the average civilian life. So, is she about ostracization and how even after being nuked, there still is a society to ostracize people? That is brought up in text, but that's not at all Cait's thing, that concept is with Hancock.

I travel with Cait to quickly get her affinity up to speedrun her "recovery" (see the Cait breakdown to learn my thoughts on That Fucking Chair) because I want her to get better...but I don't like traveling with her that much. It's not just that she often disagrees with my usual choices, she's just rather flat. I don't get the impression that the writers really considered her psychology, what she stood for, what someone should or could take away from her.

But I like her conceptually. There's a lot of fun and emotional catharsis to be had with a traumatized character like her, someone who has to navigate life after escaping her bad situations, and not knowing what to do with the survival instincts she had to cultivate, but no longer needs.

Codsworth is inoffensive to me, and I like sassy but polite characters. I find them refreshing in settings like Fallout. I had more fun imagining his lines as thinly-veiled bitching than sincerity, though. I think he's fine, just simple. Simple is best, sometimes. I wouldn't trust Beth to give the indentured servitude robot an even remotely palatable story, given how they handled the synths and their whole thing...

But Codsworth, I like having him around. He's the lemon water to the black coffee, sugary soda, whiskey, and occasional cups of tar. He's needed at a palette cleanser.

Curie should have been a main plot companion, argue with the wall. She's a Ms. Nanny who becomes a synth, which are functionally human beings. She has a lot of narrative potential, being an example and counterargument for many different things.

Unfortunately, she's kept mostly a secret, being the most hidden companion, and she's left as a simple French maid fantasy. I'm not even sure why they bothered to make her a doctor. It has nothing to do with how she's actually handled and presented. Curie's more often blushing than meaningfully interacting with the world. She talks to Amari, she becomes a synth, and the rest of her story is just her going KYAA~ at the SS. I wish they gave her some edge, some weirdness. I like my version where she's this slightly pretentious, condescending, incredibly old-seeming entity that clearly doesnt come from around here.

Danse...my boy. My boy. I adore him. You don't need me to explain why. And you don't need me to explain why his incomplete writing infuriates me.

I've said before he's very similar to Hancock, and since I have something else I want to discuss about with Johnny down in this, I'll use Danse's slot to discuss it, very quickly.

Danse and Hancock are remarkably similar people and characters, even there is parts that drift or parallel in their differences.

Substance dependency (Hancock does chems, Danse is a canonical alcoholic)

They both struggled to find their footing and place in the world, and hate the people they were in their act 1's (Hancock's takes place during his founding of Goodneighbor, Danse's after BB)

They're fiercely loyal and protective of 'their people', even if it can take a LOT for them to consider someone 'their people'

Both are suicidal and identity plays a huge part (Hancock pretends to be someone he isn't, Danse is desperate to be the person he thought he was this whole time/hates that he isn't who he thought he was)

Both of these characters are two sides of the same coin. It's just that Danse's upbringing led him to believe in authority and control being the best way to help and take care of the wasteland, Hancock's upbringing (filled with corrupt authority and control) led him to believe in an egalitarian, we-all-lift mindset where the people have the power, he's just the guy who people talk to about any issues. It's somewhat implied that Cutler was similar to Hancock, judging by Danse's few lines about Cutler.

So uuuhhh Todd where the fuck is the last 2 arcs for danse and last arc for hancock? todd? todd where the fu

As said above, Deacon is nothing to me. I like him. I don't care about him much. I think he's fun to play with, but the moment you start getting into his backstory/angst, I slide right the fuck off.

Okay, the Barb thing. Dead wife. Fucking boring story, done to death. At the point I met Deacon, I had already met Mac, Nick, knew of Longfellow and his deal. So it was like "JESUS they really dont know any other reason for a dude to be sad, do they." But the thing that keeps me from caring about Deacon is that no one can agree if Barb is real. If that actually happened.

...his backstory is supposed to inform his character. Why is Deacon doing this? Because of his backstory. If his backstory isn't real, we know nothing about Deacon, and he is, functionally, not a character. Why does Deacon lie if Barb didnt happen? Dunno. He just...does. Why is Deacon helping synths? Uhh...we needed an RR companion? Deacon's character rides or dies on Barb. If she's real, then the rest of him makes sense. She's the windex and towel to the cloudy glass house that is the rest of him. If she isn't, Deacon...doesn't matter, in any meaningful way. He's a guy in the RR who lies about everything, which means you can't care about him. Because there is nothing to care about, because it's all bullshit.

So, that's my thoughts on Deacon, in-canon. I don't know what his deal is or if his proposed deal is genuine, so I can't click with him. But in my own canon, Barb is real, so my Deacon ken-doll does appeal to me. But in Fallout 4, in text, I regard him the same as I do Tom Bombadil. To give you an idea of how flimsy Deacon is in text, a prevailing fan theory from around 2017-18 was that Deacon was Mrs. Rosa's son. Mrs. Rosa was a pre-war neighbor. Her son was a kid. The fact that Deacon is so weird and fluid and almost omniscient isn't a plus for me, it isn't a point of fascination. It's a puzzle that I know doesn't have a finished product, so I leave and go hang out with Danse, who can't speak if he isn't being absurdly blunt.

Gage is a character that deserved a better DLC. The more I think about Nuka World the more I kinda wish it was just Gage and the handmade rifle, instead the map...but that's about Nuka World. Gage himself could have easily been a swing and a miss and fall face-first into the dirt, but he's a surprisingly well-written character? There are layers of psychology with him. You can look at an action or opinion he has, and map it to something that happened to him. You can literally unravel why he does what he does, is who he is. His writers had a concept for him, and they worked backwards to understand why he would become that way.

What really sells him is his VA. Rolston put his whole pussy into that performance. Gage has so many lines that would be utter cringe if not full-assed. The "That vault suit makes your ass look great" line comes to mind...i've seen modded followers with similar lines, and jesus christ i want to pepper spray some of them. It helps that Gage has multiple faucets to his personality. It also helps that he is intentionally distinct from the other raiders, and occasionally doesn't associate with them, himself. It gives him standards and principles, which help give him shape and dimension. Good character. He isn't my favorite, that's Danse, but he's up there.

Hancock is such a waste of a character and it boggles me no one else seems to think so.

He starts on a bad note because his core reason for existing, is Beth wanted a historical figure reference. There's a reason he gives you a history lesson about John Hancock, it's so everyone knows exaclty what Johnny Ghoulie is a reference to. It's not even so much a reference, because it is a direct mimicking. I cannot stand the moments in 4 where something exists because the team learned a fun historical trivia fact, and wanted to pepper in that they did research. I've already bitched about their love of this with the Railroad at some point on this blog.

I genuinely wouldn't mind Hancock if he wasn't pulling so limp-dickedly. It's specifically the contrivance of explaining why this dude is called John Hancock, in John Hancock's clothing. It's okay if they pull from history and allude to it, But Hancock is just...some history stuff tacked on, with no real thought or care. The clothing, the name, the catchphrase. I feel like this is Disney's Hamilton on Ice.

But moving away from that...what is the point of Hancock?

Is his character about drug use and addiction? NOPE, only Cait's addiction is noteworthy. Okay...idenity issues, since he's larping? Not really. It could be, but that's not at all of interest to the story/writing itself. The Hancock thing is an aesthetic, not a trait. So, don't have that either. Is his character about leadership, in any capacity? Kinda, I guess. He briefly mentions insecurities and guilt about it a few times. But if I said "Hancock's story is about leadership", most people would raise an eyebrow and ask why. Not because it's...wrong, it's just not prominent enough to say that's his story, definitively.

So...what is the point of him? What should I take away from Hancock? Duty to the people? Preston does that, and does it better/more explicitly. Regret about past actions? Mac does that. Protecting the people from political corruption? Piper's thing (AND WE'LL GET TO FUCKING PIPER.) What is there to Hancock that isn't done by another companion? It isn't his depression because ALL these bitches be suicidal. What is unique to Hancock? Pretending to be someone else? Deacon. Drugs? Cait. Trying to figure out who you are, removed from the expections that come with having been someone else? Nick. Leadership, and the failures of it? Danse. Struggling to navigate the world in a new, different body, as a new person, functionally? Curie.

The only thing I can think of is mentioned only twice, and is immediately brushed off; the questionable nature of your leader being buddy-buddy with you, and acting like 'one of the bros' even as they hold power over you and have resources you don't. Parasocial government, if you will. It's brought up by Finn and Bobby No-Nose and is shut down/forgotten.

So...the only thing unique to Hancock, and it's regulated to, like, 3 individual throw-away lines. 2 of which you can miss.

Great.

Again, I like him. I just like him when I'm writing him, and can actually have him work through his shit and concepts. But as he stands, he's just...hey, y'know John Hancock? New Vegas also pulled from history, but New Vegas had shit to say about it. There was debating. There was actual philosophy and politics. There wasn't some dude named Caesar who was just...hanging out. What does Fallout 4 say about John Hancock?

Here's something you can say about Hancock; Hancock owned slaves. He inherited them from his uncle, Thomas Hancock. He later freed them due to terms in Thomas' will. But the guy Fallout 4 meagerly puts up as a figure of freedom and independence, and duty to fellow man, was a slave owner, and had slave owning family.

So, what does that mean for our Hancock? Who looked up to this guy, mantled him, and this guy is, in some way, a perversion of his own ideals.

And our Hancock's favorite quote is from Lincoln. Who started the Civil War. Did Lincoln own slaves? Contested, i couldn't find any clear answers. But Hancock mantles a slave owner, using a quote from the president that would try to outlaw slavery, while pushing for freedom and independence and anarchist rhetoric.

Is that the best you can do with Hancock? No. But it's an example.

MacCready, I've compared to a can of Campbell's soup. He's simple, he's decently-done. He's not Codsworth's lemon water but he isn't Cait's tar. I often struggle to write MacCready because he's so simple. There's not much there, he isn't a complex character. He's not even a complex person. And I like that! I like that the grumpy mercenary is a normal guy, who's just going through the motions and has simple desires. His type is often tar and I'm happy to see that subverted.

Its just that his lack of complexity means there's not much to say about him that you don't already know. He's accessible, which is a good thing. Most people don't want to drink tar, but if you're reaching for a fun beverage, you're not often reaching for water, either.

I think the best thing about MacCready is how excellent he is as a romance option. I think he's the strongest romantic choice in the game, period, largely due to him being a simple guy. I would go for MacCready IRL, because he's a good dad, he has good work ethic, and he's emotionally available and isn't afraid to talk feelings, without being a clusterfuck of issues. I love Danse, but you have to talk him out of suicide before you do anything, and he himself will admit that there's going to be a lot of issues simply because he doesn't know what he's doing or what he wants out of his new life.

You don't get that with MacCready. He knows what he wants and who he is and what he cares about. He's such a solid romantic interest, and there's incredible fic potential with the Sole Survivor and MacCready both as soon-to-be grieving parents.

On the flipside, I can't understand people who romance Nick and think its all sunshine and roses. Mini-rant, but /rad-roche (i think thats their user?) has the right idea, with Nick being a hot mess of unresolved issues who is never not projecting or in denial. Nick is not fit for a romantic relationship, not in the state you see him in game. Especially not before Far Harbor. Especially if you don't get the good ending of Far Harbor. I know, bisexual women, I'm sorry. He's got more shit than Danse and Hancock combined. I write romantic Nick prompts as if this isn't the case, but make no mistake. Me giving yall what you want is not me under the impression that this is a good idea.

Anyway. Nick himself.

Dead wife. Booo. I've already complained about his dumbass quest, which i really dislike for all its contrivances. Also, I find him mismatched with the world around him, and I wish there was more attention paid to that. He's a stock character playing out in real life (in Fallout 4's real life, that is). He's a 40's noir flick detective. This character does not belong in a post-apocalypse. This is an urban setting character. Fallout is not urban.

But that doesn't mean he can't exist! I just wish they went more ham with it. I mean, how does a detective function in a lawless wasteland, full of secrets simply because there's so few people see shit happening, know what goes down? It's an information blackout, out there, and a detective is all about information. Nick deserved to be let loose and go full camp on it all. Instead, we got 2 piddly little piss stains of "mystery" side quests. With someone as clashing as Nick, you really need to either sand down the edges to make him fit, or make the fact he's so weird part of the Thing. Nick is played incredibly straight, and given that that man is clearly lgbtq+, i find that almost a waste. Let this man be deranged. This is why Far Harbor is best Nick. He's holding together in the base game, but i don't want him holding together. I want him to suffer. I want him to monolog like Hamlet before driving a cane into someone's forehead.

Now, as for Piper...

Oh, Piper.

You were doomed.

You were so fucking doomed.

I've written about Piper and her shitty paper multiple times, so if you want a refresher, go to my blog > pinned post > meta section, and find the Piper posts. My peer review of The Synthetic Truth will be your best look into what I think of Piper.

The thing is, if you removed her awfully done journalism aspect, I'd like her base form! When she isn't going on and on about shit that's either wrong, baseless, or presumptuous, she's sassy, she's community-orianted, she's mischievous, she's kinda sardonic. She has a sugar problem. She's a burnt out 20 year old with a parentification issue. There's a lot to like here! The problem is they set up the journalism, fuck it up, and then veer hard-right and crash into the "I'm raising a kid when I'm not even an adult either" thing, where it had no build up or time to unfold naturally.

In my own little world, Piper's journalism fuckups are addressed and have consequences. I don't want her smoothed out and perfect, I want her glaring flaws to be intentional and acknowledged. And that just doesn't happen in text.

Ive also got a ramble on my thoughts on Preston. I've said before I don't like his voice acting most of the time, and I actually got a lot of pushback?? But the people who disagreed didnt...disagree...they just pointed out that John Gentry had a gnarly recording circumstance. I think it was that his first takes weren't supposed to be the final product, because he wasn't really intended to be the VA? Something like that, I forget. Point is, I said John Gentry obviously had a rough time in the booth, and wasn't given a fair shot, and people went "No, his voice acting is good! John Gentry just had a rough time with his line recording and wasn't given a fair shot!"

M-ma'am. Thats...what I said.

If it makes anyone feel better, I don't like the majority of the voice acting in this game...a lot of it is very 'modded skyrim character.' Remember the Skyrim Romance Mod? Thats what most of it sounds like to me. Remember Mrs. Peabody? Holy shit. Do not let anyone involved in that cook ever again. I also have personal beef with Nate. The male VA for the SS...someone, somewhere, made a bunch of choices. It was the wrong one, frequently. (The only good male SS line i can think of is the one romancing Danse. Has some texture to it. It's shy and cute, very good)

As for Preston himself, love him, love my paragon good-guy characters. He's such a sweetheart but he's down for bloodshed. I adore those kinds of characters, those "do no harm, take no shit" types. He's treated as a fluffball by fanon (when not suffering racist ass takes or absolute disregard), but Preston has got some lovely edges to him. If you go through his dialogue page and his approvals, you'll find he can be hard at times. There are moments he approves of 'asshole' choices, which is very fun. I love this dude.

Anyway hot take. IF HE WAS WHITE, ALL OF THESE BITCHES WOULD LIKE HIM. YEAH. I SAID IT. He'd be a depressed white man who's buff and kind and snarky, and you Danse girlies, you Nick girlies, you Deacon girlies, all of them would love him too. He is tailor made for standom but nooo, he isn't #FFFFFF so I guess he's doomed to stupid ass settlement jokes.

Yall lack taste. Hawk puhtoo.

SPEAKING OF AWFUL FUCKING TASTE, LEAVE MY BABY X6-88 ALONE.

X6-88 is so unappreciated. Grotesquely so, by both Bethesda and fans.

X6-88, I've said many times, is a spoiled rich man's cat who sits all poised and hisses if you so much as look at it if you're below a certain tax bracket. He's fussy and egotistical and snippy and dislikes bugs, children, water, heights, and generally anything above ground. He gushes over Danse and thinks he's the coolest. He'll let you kill the Institute if you're Railroad or Minutemen and have high affinity with him. He'll brag about getting to travel with you with his courser buddies. He's a fucking dork.

X6-88 is a nerd/prep who could be goth if left in a Hot Topic to run wild, but until then, he's in a suit for his private school and he's going to sit on HIS bench at recess and snipe at the rival school children with his friends and then he goes home and complains that his english eacher failed him on his Roman history test for writing it in perfect Latin. That is X6-88.

If you don't like X6-88 we cannot be friends. Fuckiung look at him. He's such a little shit. He's perfect.

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