And here's all of the converted Centibytes together! I had to chop the big image I had into pieces because otherwise it gets compressed to hell, lol

all the news going around with unity's really got me worried for games that are already several years into development like Hollow Knight Silksong and Billie Bust up.

Just rough because I don't suppose a whole lot of games are going to be able to pivot game engines, let alone so late in development. Like it is easier said than done to pivot early in development but i've been following the development of several games that are years in at this point and the fact that they're grandfathering older titles into this is just... it's just bad.

The potential loss of games in terms of archival on such a massive scale....

it's 20 degrees btw

FOREWARNING FOR GROSS-OUT SKIN CLOSEUP SHIT DON'T YELL AT ME FOR SHOWING YOU has anyone else gotten this really weird phenomenon on youtube. I swear every algorithm on every website is actively and purposely worse now. Where you'll be scrolling through vids after searching for something (I was looking at crochet stuff) and SANDWICHED IN THE MIDDLE OF ACTUAL SEARCH RESULTS... YOU KNOW. LIKE THINGS RELEVANT TO THE KEYWORDS I TYPED

are a couple of completely out of left field SHOCK VALUE VIDS. like to intentionally be alarming. drama vids and things you're enticed to click on bc they're upsetting, and deep deep closeups on zits. what the fuck is going on. Sandwiched between videos about GRANNY SQUARES. crack? is it crack we're smoking????

Comparing your work to other people's is a great way to kill your joy for a thing so let me be clear and say this is not that, I am just a human person with human emotions and sometimes that means needing to be the tiniest bit petty and then moving on. You know. For your health or something.

There is a very popular cosplayer who coincidentally keeps doing the same costumes as me, and I am just the tiniest bit annoyed about it, because as is the case with many (...most) very popular cosplayers, they have a very specific, airbrushed, conventionally attractive, perfect makeup, etc aesthetic to all their photos that is. Not what I personally value in cosplay, at least. Which is fine! Different people having different approaches to costumes is part of what makes cosplay such an interesting hobby!

But it does bother me a tiny bit that the work I put into my costumes is not necessarily the kind of work that gets attention, and it does make it a little glaringly obvious when it's The Same Characters.

(Also you all know the kinds of characters I cosplay. I gravitate towards them in part because they have weird energy, not super put together attractive energy. But that's only part of my point.)

Anyways. I do not follow them on Instagram because why would I do that, but nonetheless I saw that they're apparently also doing a Laois cosplay now, which I guarantee will get lots more attention than mine. And for the most part that's fine, I love cosplay and I love doing my weird little thing and I especially love that I do in fact know other people that value the same things as me & that we have fun together. I will have a great time in my fun little costume, dressing up with my friends in their fun little costumes and I am looking forward to it. And I do not actually need likes to validate that I am becoming a pretty damn good cosplayer (whose stuff is better quality than many popular cosplayers' because I care more about craftsmanship than I do getting attention). I am even thinking pretty seriously about having Laois be my first ever competition costume if the armor turns out alright, because I think I'm genuinely getting to that level.

But it would just be kind of neat if being a weird little guy with weird little ideas who is into the hobby because I like sourcing historical patterns and materials and thinking about the worldbuilding that goes into costumes and creating neat little "in-universe" ephemera to hand out to people and all the things I like didn't always mean getting overshadowed by Instagram Perfect Attractive People.

Alas. Okay glad that's out of my system I'm normal again. I'm going to make some more chain mail.

I posted this on twitter at the beginning of the show haha joke on me.

Trigun Stampede | s01e01

He’s like you...

[ID: A gifset of Trigun Stampede episode one. As people run for shelter in Jeneora Rock, Meryl seethes, “That coward!” She starts to rush forward, but Roberto grabs her by the back of her jacket and tosses her behind him into an alleyway. He says, “You've nearly died enough today, newbie.”

She comes up to the outer edge of the alley with him, and people run in the background as Roberto says, “The two of us are just reporters. Not bodyguards, or police, or anything else.” Meryl protests, “Yeah, but--” and Roberto says, “What's more...”

Meryl looks down, abashed, as he says, “It takes a level of experience that you most certainly do not have before you can fling around the word "coward." Understand me?” She says quietly, “... Yes.”

Meryl starts walking back with Roberto, but she turns when a civilian off-screen yells to Vash, “Vash! Get down here! Hurry!” Vash is standing on a cliff, framed by a red sky, and he shouts back, “Tell everybody to take cover!”

Meryl says, “He's trying to keep the townsfolk safe.” Roberto replies, “At this point, bravery is plain stupid.”

Vash’s lenses hide his eyes, making his expression unreadable, but then he looks up with determination as Roberto concludes, “He's like you, not long for this world.”

A slow motion shot shows Vash pulling out his gun and then rapidly aiming it upwards. End ID]

Credit to @princess-of-purple-prose​​ for the image description.

Eldritch Echo

So. I haven't seen the Bad Batch and don't really intend to, but I have read some fics (please do not take that as me saying that's the same as understanding the story) and between that and my thoughts of eldritch stuff in Star Wars and a cool art piece I came across that I think was referencing something I don't have the context for, I started wondering what it'd look like if of the Bad Batch, Echo was the only eldritch/cryptid/vampire/otherwise not human one. NOT because of the Techno Union, but because of something that happened sooner OR he'd always been like that. And I might put a bit of that in my vampire clones thing but I was thinking eldritch and I ended up writing a thing. So. Enjoy:

***********

Crosshair’s willing to admit he doesn’t dislike Echo. He respects the guy’s resilience and his willingness to go with the flow, which is necessary for someone working with their team, even as he rolls his eyes at Echo’s tendency to twitch at the state of their ship and his reluctance to drop the “sir” when talking to Hunter. More than that Echo has zero qualms about sassing him if Crosshair picks a fight and it’s a lot of fun to rile him up.

That said. Echo is also really freaking weird.

Crosshair is very observant, between his eyesight, his role on the team, and his training he had to be and either something’s very off about Echo or he’s started hallucinating because he keeps seeing things that don’t make sense. Not for a reg and not for a cyborg.

He explains this the Hunter once, trying to see if he’s noticed anything, and Hunter frowns. “Can you give me an example?”

“His eyes for one.”

Hunter blinked. “What?”

“We all know what most trooper’s eyes look like. And we’ve seen some variations. But they don’t change color. I’ve seen his eyes go golden or violet, and it wasn’t the lighting.”

“You’re sure?”

“Yes I’m sure what do you take me for?” Crosshair snapped. “Look. Next time we’re on a sunny planet. Take a look at his shadow. It doesn’t match him at all. I’ve seen it prowling around him like a tooka without him or a light source moving. It doesn’t look like him either. And remember that time we were sparring and he panicked and bit me? I asked Tech, the Techno Union didn’t do anything to his teeth, but I know what bitemarks look like and that was not it.”

Hunter sighed. “I’ll pay attention but-” He paused. “Huh.”

“What?”

“It might not be anything.” He replies and only knowing that he’s getting to the point keeps Crosshair from interrupting. “But remember how I told you guys that people smell like animals? They’re distinct from each other, and you know I can’t describe it cause I tried to describe you guys, but it’s not like they smell like flowers or old books or whatever people like to think they’d smell like unless they’re wearing a scent. Echo, he doesn’t smell like a trooper. I just never thought about it for some reason.”

“And what does he smell like?”

Hunter frowned as he tried to find the words. “Well. He does smell a bit like a trooper and a bit metallic. But he also smells like, what’s was the spice in that cake you liked so much? The one we found on that mission with the weird vultures?”

Crosshair hummed. That had been a really freaking good cake. “The lady said it was a cardamon cream cake. So he smells like cardamon?”

“Cardamon and lilies and wet dirt is the best way I can describe it and I know it’s not his soap cause he uses the same stuff as the rest of us. So yeah. I guess I’ll pay attention.”

Two days later Crosshair gets confirmation that something’s up in a way he did not expect.

Because walking around in the dark in the middle of the night is his job so it’s already odd to find Echo leaning against the cabinet in their ship’s tiny kitchen in the pitch dark. “You’re going to trip reg.” Crosshair says and leans over to get the lights when Echo looks up.

And twelve pairs of golden violet eyes meet Crosshair’s.

He staggers back, trips over something, falls. “Crosshair!” Echo grabs his hand, pulling him up, then scrambles for the lights as if he forgot they might be necessary and Crosshair yelps as the light hits his eyes.

He blames that and the shock for blurting out; “What the hell are you Echo?”

Echo blinks, looking hurt. “I’m a trooper. Like you all.”

“Troopers don’t have twenty-four freaking eyes.” Crosshair hissed. They aren’t there now, he’s got 2 brown eyes in the exact same shade of brown nearly every trooper has, but Crosshair knows what he saw. He knows what he’s been seeing.

Echo tilts his head. And he grins. It’s a smile Crosshair’s seen before, whenever Echo’s about to respond to his taunts with something cutting and clever, part “take that” and part inviting him to share the joke. There’s nothing off about that smile save for that it’s mirrored in Echo’s shadow, splayed against the cabinets behind him too dark for their lights.

“The Bad Batch.” Echo muses, like there’s a joke Crosshair hasn’t caught yet, and he’s never had a reason to call Echo dangerous even when he didn’t trust him, but he’s starting to feel cornered even though Echo hasn’t moved. “You think you’re the only strange ones. ‘Don’t worry Rex, we know how to handle a reg.’ Never mind that Torrent was always a little crazy, or it used to be. Never mind that I was an ARC and a damn good one, and we’re all more than competent. And I appreciate what you all did, in welcoming me into the squad, I appreciate it more than I can say, and I do really like you guys, but you are so freaking cocky. So certain you can handle anything. And to be fair you’re damn good at your job, but sometimes it’s annoying. So.” He grins that taunting grin again. “You want to know what the reg’s deal is? Figure it out.”

He leaves. His grinning shadow lingers a moment before following. Crosshair stares.

And then decides that a glass of water isn’t gonna cut it and goes for the stash of moonshine.

felix being referred to more or less exclusively as "your soldier" in-game speaks to how little the writers put into his character beyond his noggin full of sith secrets & his relationship with the consular; still, i do find it kind of sweet and funny, in a way. he's not a republic soldier, not even your personal bodyguard; he's your soldier. the consular is a small nation-state in and of herself

I think the thing that makes masking disability very complex is that often, masking is done to protect one's self, but you still don't know exactly how you'll be perceived by other people, and if you're safe in the ways you want to be. Something I've learned more and more is that... you often can't "fully mask" in the sense that there are certain blindspots you may miss. My flat, monotonous affect stems from autism, and while I can (and do) mask other traits, I can never mask that trait. But, the thing is that I don't detect that I am monotonous, and I only learned that because other people perceived me that way and actually told me. That's what I mean by masking only goes so far, often.

Why I Am Not Coming In To Work Today [abridged], Jess Zimmerman

part one | part two

Bucket Bucket Bucket ♥ (Patreon)

I literally gasped, my original Bucket <3 <3 It was all worth it

Hello! I just saw you post some Maitre Gims, and I know you like Stromae, so I was wondering what are french/french speaking singers that you like the most? You may have answered smtg like that already but i couldn't find it and I am, as always, very curious ^^ -☆

mc solaar!!!!!! and stromae for sure. and i had a whole renan luce phase in college. otherwise i mostly just listen to individual songs and don't tend to know a ton by the same artist, but i've liked some individual songs by christine and the queens, lous and the yakuza, tryo, kana, bénabar, vianney. some other artists but that's a sample. currently only know two french-language songs by mika but i like them. always looking for recs if you have any!

"It's not the game. That's not what we're arguing about. It is all about an inherent thing we do of social sorting. The reason we socially sort is because we want to put ourselves into a group that gives us a sense of belonging, a sense of friendship, love, whatever you want to call it, and creating a sense of identity through which you can express yourself. These are very important things to people. [...] That is what people are really fighting over. It's masked under all these arguments over these merits about the game, but that's not actually what people are fighting about. They are fighting to defend their sense of identity and belonging from those who they believe are attacking that with their opinions about the game. [...] "What you can do is at least be aware of what's really going on inside of you when you get these strong feelings -- when you see these opposing views to what you believe. [...] Realize what's happening -- realize what's really happening. Take a step back from that. You have this cognizant higher thinking part of your brain right here behind your freaking forehead that you can use to go, 'Hold on a second, emotional part back there. This actually isn't all that serious.' [...] "Because it's going to happen. You're going to have a feeling that comes up. You're going to see somebody who says something and you're just going to feel annoyed. You're going to feel angry. You're going to feel all those feelings. You don't have a choice in that, by the way. That's just going to happen to you. That's the part we're saying you can't control about your human nature. But you can control -- being aware of where that's really coming from -- how you go about responding to that. [...] "We have to wrestle with this. We have to wrestle with how we respond to this. Because [...] we have tools at our disposal that put us into contact with people who, it feels like, are threatening us all the time when they're not. They're not. They're not threatening you. It feels like they are -- it really feels like it. Trust me, I know exactly what you're feeling. [...] I could not control myself. I literally couldn't for a while. If I saw somebody say something like that, I felt the need to validate my position, clarify, tell this guy or girl or whoever was saying it why they're wrong. It's in me, too. [...] "And, I feel like, just in the past couple weeks, I had a little bit of a breakthrough, where I was looking through some comments and I saw something, and I just kind of laughed at it instead of getting angry. I laughed at it because it was wrong; I didn't get angry because it was wrong. Like, my brain -- the prefrontal cortex finally broke through and convinced the amygdala that: 'You can laugh at that; it's okay. You're not threatened. Just laugh it off and walk away. You don't have to fight this person. You don't have to engage. You don't have to prove that they didn't understand what you really meant. You don't have to do that. It's just a video game.'"

-- Mike from Resonant Arc, talking about video game discourse and shipping wars

I drew these originally to be Amelia O'Brien from 'tales from the gas station' but I wound up liking the design I came up with a lot. She came out really cute. So maybe I'll change her to be an oc instead of a headcannon for a book. I'll be tagging her as Amelia too just in case.