Ok so in Dark season 2 episode 5 when the Stranger is basically having the sex dream about Martha - the black stuff that comes out of her stomach (yeah if you don’t remember the scene this sounds very weird) is the matter that essentially powers the time machines right (I can’t remember the name of it)??

So was that just foreshadowing of the Unknown or was it the Stranger being aware on some level of the other timeline? Because we do have characters in the show saying stuff that matches with the alt!world - but once again not sure if its foreshadowing or intentional. 

Or was it just something they decided to add like Jonas seeing Mikkel is the black sludge and Martha seeing herself covered in it. 

Jonas’ dream in Season 2, Episode 5.

on writing kiddos

Hi, hello there, it’s me again back with the first bit of meta in a really long time. I’ve been incredibly distracted with school as well as my longfic, which was actually the inspiration for this post.  Just to provide some context, I write a story that spans the lives of my two protagonists from the time they are young children, all the way to their mid twenties, highlighting pivotal moments in their childhood that have had some lasting impact on their present day selves, and as such, I have spent quite a lot of time writing from the perspective of precocious kids and moody teens.  

Fortunately, I love kids, and I’ve had years of experience in both being a big sister and working professionally with kids as both a childcare worker and a therapist.  I’ve gotten to spend a lot of time around kiddos and learn the inner workings of their amazing, rapidly developing brains, and so I’m here to share some of the things I’ve learned AND how it can be applied in a writing situation.  I know that lots of people have apprehensions when writing kids, and so I hope that my anecdotal tips will be helpful to someone out there.

I’ll drop the rest behind a handy dandy read more to spare your all’s feeds. ;D

Age and Cognitive Development

When we write adult characters, part of getting their characterization pinned down is understanding how they think, and the same thing applies to kiddos! Cognitive and socio-emotional development are long-researched topics, so there are a multitude of varying theories, and it can be quite complex to break down into neat categories that apply to all kids.  In fact, all kids develop at different rates, despite following the same general trajectory.

Generally speaking, children start out understanding the world primarily through their senses, reflexes, and movements (interactions with the environment), and end with a fairly complex system of abstraction and understanding of hypotheticals.  (Note that these development ranges are based upon those who are neurotypical and neurodiverse characters would not necessarily have the same markers, so if anyone has any specific tips for writing neurodiverse kids and would like to chime in, please feel free to do so!)

0-2 years - highly sensory/motor based, lots of reflexes; learn the difference between self and environment and differences between objects.  Emotions develop more rapidly, beginning with anger, disgust, fear, surprise, happiness, and gradually developing more and more complicated feelings.  Even at 2 years old, they are likely to not have a solid grasp on labeling the ways they are feeling, and things are mostly behavioral and reflexive. 

2-7 years - children begin to understand symbols and develop language, beginning with the basics and progressing to fairly complex thoughts.  Children between these ages think in a very concrete fashion and are highly reliant upon objects, but they do begin to pretend and roleplay. Children around these ages are egocentric and usually struggle to take the perspective of others. However, they begin to develop the ability to identify and express their feelings and thoughts simply, but struggle to understand the thoughts and feelings of others. 

Mommy had a scrunched up face when she looked a the mess in the house. Billy didn’t really know why her face did that sometimes. (approx 4ish)

7 - 11(ish) - Development of perspective-taking and concrete problem-solving. Thoughts gradually become more complex and holistic, though children at this stage of development take things literally, and at face-value. They typically can understand their own feelings and infer the feelings of others from facial expressions, body language, etc., although they may be inaccurate in their assumptions. 

Mommy’s face scrunched up when she looked at the mess Billy made in the floor.  It was the same face she made when Daddy didn’t take his shoes off before stepping on the carpet.  It usually meant mommy was annoyed  (Approx. 7-8)

Mom’s face wrinkled when she looked at the mess Billy had left in the floor.  He began to pick his things up so she wouldn’t fuss at him. (Approx 10 or 11)

11+ - The ability to think in the abstract and understand hypotheticals begins to develop around age 11, however, it’s different for everyone.  Children and teens usually start to have rather complex thoughts and make inferences based on subtle cues.  They’re able to manipulate information mentally and come to develop their own opinions and conclusions. 

Billy’s mother wasn’t even home yet, and he could already see the look on her face she would have when she saw the mess on the floor.  He hurredly began to scrub the stain from the rug.  He was going to be in so much trouble. He knew it.  

Teenagerdom - Most teens have all the complex thoughts and emotions that adults have, but often have less experience and/or ability to cope with and regulate those thoughts and feelings. Many teens are stuck in this place of being expected to behave in an adult way, while still being treated as a child.  It’s a rough time.  Not to mention, teenagers experience a re-emergence of  egocentrism that takes the form of “Everyone is watching and judging me all the time,” and also “Nobody has ever experienced what I am experiencing and if they have experienced it, then they haven’t experienced it to this degree.”  That all settles down with cognitive maturation and experiences; however, the experiences of teenagers often extend well into the 20s. 

Examining the mess on the floor, Billy knew that his mother was going to kill him.  Murder.  She’d chew him up and spit him back out, never to see the light of day again.  It was the end.  Unless of course he could scrub the stubborn stain from the rug.  This had to be the worst thing that could have possibly happened. 

Personal Experience and Intelligence

As I mentioned above, those age ranges are broad, general “this is sort of what should be happening when,” but they’re more guidelines rather than hard and fast rules.  When writing children, it is helpful to consider the personal experiences a child has had in their lives up to that point as well as their intelligence.  Those are not the measure of a person (even a little one), but they make a huge difference in the rate at which a child matures and interacts with the world.  Generally kids who have more difficult upbringings and those who end up parenting themselves and/or caring for siblings, often seem older than they really are, particularly in regard to their behavior. 

Just to provide some examples for reference, the children that I write in my story are mostly nobles who have relatively comfortable, safe, and happy childhoods.  My Cousland, Liss, is generally a carefree, impulsive, emotional, messy, privileged child, and so I modeled her development more closely in line with the “guidelines.”  Nathaniel is also a noble, but he’s more thoughtful, and has kind of been placed into a parental role in that his dad is emotionally abusive at the very least, and after his mother dies, he is the rock that his siblings stand on, and at that point in time, he is only 10.  He has to grow up a lot faster than he may have had to otherwise. As a very strong counterpoint, there are other characters who do not have any environmental privileges during their childhood.  A very good portrayal of this sort of thing is this comparison of Isabela and Hawke’s respective upbringings.

Both intelligence and life experiences can lead to a quicker rate of cognitive development and maturation in some cases, that does not mean that they are “grown up” or in anyway done developing.  Even the brightest kids, even the kids who have faced unbelievable adversity are still kids and they often still experience impulsivity, emotion dysregulation, and other things that one might not see in adults with the same experiences.  Furthermore, some kids may not even experience advanced development, instead regressing from the lack of social support and modeling from attachment figures. 

Basically, nothing is hard and fast. 

Personality

The next thing I wanted to touch upon is personality.  I think there is a tendency to portray all kids as Standard Kids (which I have endearingly coined Standard Kid Syndrome).  It is all well and good if the intention is just to show a Standard Kid; however, if you really want to dig deep into a character, into who that child is, it’s so important to consider personality traits.  From birth, children have dispositions, and as they grow and learn more about themselves and the world, those dispositions become personality.  Personality traits should shine through very early on!  Kids can be open to experience or rigid and anxious, they can be introverted or extroverted, they can be impulsive or restrained, they can be aggressive, meek, funny, serious, meticulous, silly, cool, gruff, grumpy, snarky, sassy, nerdy, quirky, shy, friendly, withdrawn, and so on and so forth.  Children are new humans; they are not incomplete humans. 

The Kid Voice

When writing from the point of view of a child, all of the things discussed above factor into word choice.  Just like writing adult characters, the way a kid talks in dialogue, or narrates even, is influenced by a blend of so many different things.  Young kids’ descriptions are going to have simpler sentence structures and words.  They may introspect less and observe more.  They may express themselves through their bodies and actions more.  They may have trouble describing what they’re feeling, or understanding what they’re seeing.  Teens may describe things more dramatically and intensely than similar adults would.  They may not.  What is important is considering the mix of traits and experiences they have in relation to cognitive development.  It’s really no different from writing any other character.  It just takes research and planning to get in The Zone.

TL;DR

- Understanding how kids think is a good starting point to writing kids

- Personal experiences, intelligence, and the interaction of qualities can influence how a child thinks in a multitude of ways

- Kids have personalities!  They’re not blank slates that have yet to be filled.  They are whole people, and it’s good to give proper care to show those unique, wonderful little minds that they have

- It’s not so much different than writing adults! It just takes some time spent looking through a different lens!

- This is not a comprehensive reference by any means, so please feel free to chime in!

Let’s take a break from specific fandoms to talk about:

Platform Wars

In 2020, we’re all asking what’s next after Tumblr. This is nothing new. “Is thing X killing thing Y?” is a question fandom has been asking since long before Escapade. But these panels offer comfort and insight into our current fear of change.

They’re also fucking hilarious.

So, without further ado, here are some past Escapade panels on the subject of Change Is Scary:

1997 - Effects of the Internet on Fandom & Slash (On the upside: more fans, more conventions, more excitement and a 24-hour party. On the downside: are the connections more shallow? Are the changes made to "fandom as we knew it" change what we enjoy? Do print fans have something to fear? Or is this simple another wave?)

2000 - Less is More: Gluttony & the Decline of Quality in Fanfic

2004 - Amusing Ourselves to Death (Fannish Discourse in the the Age of the Internet By sheer quantity, has the quality of our conversation declined to predominantly static?)

2004 - LiveJournal, Boon or Bane? (Has the advent of LiveJournal brought about the demise of mailing lists? Has it splintered the venue for discussion to the point where it's impossible to have meaningful conversation? Is the LJ phenomenon just one big egotrip? Come join us to discuss these and other questions.)

2007 - Is F’locked the New Black (Is the flocked post the future of fan communication? Are we returning to the dark ages of closed lists, zines under the table, and "have to know someone"? More and more LJ posts are locked, communities are closed, and groups are invitation only. Is there a way to protect our RL selves (and our fannish selves), yet share our fannish commentary and fic? How does this all look to a newbie? Where is our new comfort zone? And how do we keep track of all of this?)

2008 - The Organization for Transformative Works (The Best Thing Since Ever, or the End Of Days? The OTW is an incorporated nonprofit organization established by fans to serve the interests of fans in multiple ways, including by providing open-source archive software (and an archive), legal assistance, and various efforts to preserve the history of fanworks and fan culture.)

2011 - Delicious - Rumors of Death Greatly Exaggerated? (Delicious, fandom's favorite bookmarking site may be getting shut down (or at least sold out) by The Man. What to do?)

2016 - Fandom Is Fic: from BNF to TL;DR. (From paper through Usenet to Livejournal, text was king. On Tumblr, long text is an imposition—isn’t it? Has fic been dethroned from its place at the top of the heap and fic-writing BNFs along with it? Discuss the dirty little social dynamics of the shifting patterns of fannish value and how we define 'fandom' itself. And what of zines and zine eds?)

2017 - The Kids Are Not the Problem (In recent years, media fandom has grown enormously. It has also scattered, spreading out to new platforms and meeting spaces. You often hear talk about "the kids" vs. "the olds," Tumblr vs. LiveJournal, or the problem of recruiting and retaining new fans. In this panel, let’s try flipping that script. If kids are not the problem, how can we change and grow? What awesome things are other fans doing/trying that people at Escapade should know about? Most importantly, what strategies can we use to leave our fannish bubbles and more fully experience fandom in 2017?)

2019 - The fall of tumblr (Fans have always looked for a good place to build communities on line. Recent events with Tumblr and other platforms like Facebook are restricting our gathering places and even blocking and purging our self-made content. How are people dealing with this? Fandom will survive, but where? Come discuss the problems and options out there.)

And below the cut, a whole bunch more panels on platforms and change:

1991 - Quality Control in Zine Publication/Economics of Fandom (Who is making money in fandom? Should they be? How accountable are fans? Editors? Artists? Have you ever written an LOC?)

1993 -  Supply and Demand in Fandom (Can we have too much of a good thing? How many cons or zine is too many? Are we glutting the market?)

1994 - Changing Nature of Fannish Communication (E-mail, and virtual zines, computer video editing and morphing -- all the new toys at our disposal...)

1996 - Internet—Will it eat your brain? Or take you to the poorhouse? (Nearly everyone has or can get access to a computer and thereby the Internet and the World Wide Web. What's out there for fans? What should you look for? What might you want to watch out for? How can you protect your pocketbook at the same time?)

1997 - Net Fiction & Print Fiction (Is the very existence of net fic changing the characteristics or reducing the quantity of print fic? Are there really stylistic and/or content differences? What makes some shows predominantly produce netfic, while others happily generate both? How do the barriers of access to each affect the fan community?)

1997 - History of Fan Socialization (Was fandom really different in the "old days"? Was there a feeling of community that we're missing now? Or is that just nostalgia clouding our memories? In today's net-connected fandom, what is (or should be) different? And what elements of the past should we try and retain?)

1998 - Professionals: Is the Circuit Dead? (Or has it just moved on-line? Is Pros fandom split on the subject of the internet? Many old circuit writers don't want anything to do with the new on-line library. They have objected to having their stories retyped an sent out, even on private e-mail. Has the paper circuit given way to the on-line library?)

1998 - Netfic Formatting A: How to Print It Prettily (An instructional panel, covering the basics of formatting, macros, and other time-saving tips to get the results you want.)

1998 - Privacy and Community: Pseudonyms, Screen Names and Face-to-Face Meetings (As more and more fandom is found online, how are we adapting to the anonymity that comes with it?)

1998  - Netfic Formatting B: From Word to Web, Making Shapely Net Slash (This panel is for everyone who wants to venture into the world of online slash, but gets nervous when faced with the myriad technical difficulties. Relax, it's easier than you think. We look at stylistic conventions, how to make your work newsgroup and e-mail friendly, and the dreaded subject header alphabet soup. We'll also cover some basic info on how to make a www archive site user friendly.)

1998 - Crossing the Line (An instructional panel on how to get what you want (more stories) in a world that may be unfamiliar to you (the web for print fans, and the insular world of zines for net fans).)

1999 - Does Print Fandom Have a Future? (In the age of instant, free net fic, is print fandom a dinosaur on its way to extinction, or a promise of reasonable quality in a sea of mediocrity? What are the key differences between zines and netfic, and what are the advantages and disadvantages of each? Can the two coexist happily? )

2000 - Promoting Critique on Mailing Lists (How to promote critical discussion and attention to the mechanics of writing on email lists?)

2000 - Changing Power Dynamics in Fandom (With the decline of zine editors and growth of the Net, what's changed, and how does it affect us and our fanfic?)

2001 - Website Workshop 2 by the lady of shalott (Setting up and maintaining a fanfic archive, and in particular how to set up the Automated Archive software used by 852 Prospect and the Due South archives.) [NB: Yes, she went through a bunch of name versions before ‘astolat’.]

2002 - How to run a Fiction Archive (and Maintain Your Sanity)

2002 - Nobody Here But Us Sockpuppets (How multiple personality disorder takes on a whole new meaning in the world of mailing lists.)

2003 - Getting slash onto your PalmPilot for computer free reading

2003 - Recs Databases! Creation and Commiseration (Do you run a recs database and want to commiserate? Do you currently have a recs page and want to become database-driven? Want to talk about the relative merits of using PHP, MySQL, or Access to organize smut?)

2003 - How to Set Up and Maintain Fanfiction Archives (If you're thinking of running an archive, or already do and need some help, this is the panel for you. We'll cover everything from choosing a method of archiving, handling fandom growth, dealing with troublemakers, and just how much time, webspace and money are we talking, anyway? Come pick the archivists' brains.)

2003 - Has Escapade Run Its Course (Scuttlebut says: It's not like it used to be. My old friends don't come any more. My new friends can't get in. It's too big. It's too small. Oxnard, for god's sake? I'm getting sick and tired of the same shit year after year. Is Escapade old and tired? Does it need to be retired?)

2004 - HTML and Website Introduction (if you don't have a website and want to create one. where doyoustart'This will cover creating basic HTML pages and common webhosting options, as well as things to think about as you set iin vour first website.)

2005 - Where Have All The Good Conversations Gone? Rise & Fall of the Escapade Panel (Are people still interested in talking about the characters, plots, and themes of their shows? Has in-depth analysis of our fandoms been abandoned in favor of meta and fannish introspection? The forums for analytical discussion are disappearing as self-censorship and over-moderation increase. Can we change this? Do we want to?)

2005 - The Fannish Wiki (So we have the directorium, the directory of All Things Fannish. We visit it and it's just so cool, and we look for our fandom to see what it says... and it's not there! How to add it? What sort of info belongs there? How does a wiki work?)

2005 - I Was So Much Older Then, I'm Younger Than That Now (We've all heard about or lived through the tumultuous era when fandom moved online. But how has slash fandom, particularly slash fandom, changed since then? Are the changes the result of online fandom, or simply of a change in culture?)

2005 - Fanfic Archives (Setting up and administering fanfic archives: concepts, considerations, techniques.)

2006 - Putting your fic on the web (Basic skills for putting your fic on the web, including building your own very basic website, using LJ as a fic-site building tool, various options for labeling adult content, and using the standard upload interfaces for popular self-submit story archive software.)

2006 - Nifty Technology and the Future of Fandom (Fandom is quick to adapt to change and continues to bring fen together and to create fannish product. Fans have thrived regardless of how they communicate; via the post office, mailing lists, message boards, and Livejournal; they've pushed the frontiers of video and audio technology; and have managed to survive changes in copyright, pornography, and other laws. What are the upcoming trends and shiny new technologies on the horizon and how will fen use them to enhance fandom?)

2006 - Intermediate Webmastering (Designing your website for usability, options for restricting access to your website, making your stories easily accessed by mobile devices, and things to consider so fans can easily locale your site.)

2007 - Free Webtools and How to Take Fandom Advantage (Lots of free tools are available on the web to help the needy fan! Tools to edit pictures, make icons, write stories, share recommendations, share stories, and be fannish are becoming more available and more user friendly. Come chat about tools like del.icio.us, google docs, pxn8 audacity, itunes, the gimp, bittorrent, imeem, youtube and lll other things that you come and tell us about!)

2008 - E-book Readers (Sony PRS-505 or Amazon Kindle what's all the fuss about? Introduction to E-Ink and other mobile devices. What are the pros and cons of various devices? Where do you find e- books and fan fiction, and most importantly how do you get fan fiction formatted so you can read it on your ebook reader?)

2008 - If You Build It, Will They Come? (Roundtable on meta fannish infrastructure building strategies. bethbethbeth can talk about some of the specific challenges OTW is facing in its brave new fan territory, while oulangi can talk about why metafandom has flourished while very similar projects have failed, while we'll both discuss some of the challenges of the established meta/fannish structure of new communities, new fans, new technologies—and most of all, how do you keep the meta-fan conversation moving forward?)

2008 - Livejournal: Should Fans Take Their Business Elsewhere? (A discussion of the pros and cons of fannish communication on the various blogging entities.)

2008 - How to Find and Use Free Stuff on the Web (All kinds of free webapps are available for fic, art, icons, communication, and all sort of other fannish stuff. Come share favorite sites—we can bookmark everything we talk about on del.icio.us in real time!)

2009 - The Organization for Transformative Works (Off the ground and starting to soar! Come here about the latest developments in the OTW's projects and discuss where you'd like to see it go next.)

2010 - Is Somebody Taking Notes On This?: A Discussion of the Role of Fannish History (In honor of Escapade's 20th anniversary, let's talk about recording fannish history. What are the challenges? Is it worth doing? Can it be done in a fair way? What are we afraid of happening if we try? Is Fanlore the right vehicle for the project?)

2010 - The OTW in Its Third Year led by Elke Tanzer and Shoshanna (Okay, sure, the Organization for Transformative Works bought its own goddamn servers and hosted an archive (that hosted Yuletide) and published a journal (with a special issue on Supernatural) and saved a bunch of Geocities sites and testified at the DMCA hearings (supporting the FFF's proposed exemptions for vidders and other remix artists) and made a bunch of lolcats—but what have they done for us lately? [5] What do you want them to do?)

2010 - We Are All Naked (On The Internet Now) led by treewishes (Social networking platforms like Facebook and Twitter are conspiring with Google and your ISP to out your slash pseudonym to your RL friends, and to tell all your slash buddies your real name. Is there any way to stop the wave of facial recognition software or your oh-so-helpful friends who type your birthday into the cloud? Or is all this an inevitable consequence of evolving technology? Come on in and let's talk conspiracy theories!)

2011 - Fanlore: Are BNFs Writing Our History?, led by Sandy H (Fanlore has an official policy of 'plural points of view', but is that really happening? Have you ever looked up a kerfluffle you were involved in, and seen how your side of the battle was portrayed.' And on the other side, are we afraid of conflict, to the point that Fanlore is bland and safe?)

2011 - OTW/AO3 Wish List Conversation, led by Sandy H (Do you feel like you don't know how to get your A03 or OTW wishlist through the bureaucracy? A03 is getting better all the time, but there's a ways to go. Let's brainstorm and turn a list over at the end of the panel.)

2011 - The Reccing Crew (Recommending a fanwork is deeply woven into our culture. Are there new social mores at work when we make public recs? How has the move from letters to mailing lists to Livejournal and Delicious affected reccing? Delicious was conceived as a bookmarking site, but often operates as a recs and comments site. If it goes away, what would replace it?)

2012 - Tumblr, Twitter, and Pinboard, Oh My (and GetGlue, too!) (In the past year, the ongoing fannish diaspora has picked up speed, as more fannish activity has moved away from LiveJournal and Dreamwidth, and onto sites like Tumblr and Twitter. And then there was the Delicious implosion. Now there's GetGlue, a social network specifically for entertainment. Let's talk about navigating these sites—their strengths and weaknesses, and how to use them.)

2012 - The Kids These Days (Ever wanted to tell someone to get offa your lawn? Strangle the next person who said that? Revive a dead fandom? Joined a fandom you were 20 years "too old" (or young!) for? Did you go from Usenet to mailing lists? From zines to livejournal? Are you eyeing Tumblr and Twitter with alarm? Let's talk about weathering changes in fandom with grace—or at least a little humor.)

2013 - Privacy, Secrecy, and the Fourth Wall (The fourth wall between fans and The Powers That Be is shrinking day by day. Are the technologies we're using changing fannish etiquette {from invite-only mailing lists, to friends-locked journals, to all public all the time tumblr)? Should we run for the hills or embrace the change? Discuss!)

2013 - The What With the Where Now?! (Every time you turn around fandom is playing on a new site that has new functionality, new ways of interacting and new lingo. Join us in surveying places like tumblr, twitter and getglue.)

2014 - Tumblr: Missing Missing E (So you've just gotten the hang of Livejournal when all of a sudden fandom has jumped shipped to this new "microblogging" platform called Tumblr. What is "microblogging" anyway, and where do you even start? Join us in this tutorial/discussion on creating an account, deciphering the culture, finding fandom, and making Tumblr work for you.)

2014 - Out Of Step With the World (You have no current fandom. You can't even get Tumblr to load. What do you do when you're feeling disconnected and alienated, but you don't want to leave fandom for good? If this sounds like you, come join us to figure out some strategies for rekindling the love, making new friends, and finding your place.)

2014 - Real Fannish Community (Has AO3 ended the era of real fannish community or has it ushered in a new era of increased connectedness? Is Tumblr better or worse than the old days (and were the old days livejournal? yahoo groups? APA snail mail zine groups?)? I'm hoping for equal parts 'get off my lawn' and 'the future's so bright I gotta wear shades' debate here.)

2015 - Tumblr 102: Into Darkness. You’re here, now what? Here we talk about etiquette and xkit and making the most of your fannish tumblr experience.

2017 - Home on the Web (LJ's Russian overlords have removed HTTPS support and are moving the server activity to Russia; some say a shutdown of US services is on the horizon. Yahoo fails to make money with Tumblr. Dreamwidth is slow, and doesn't have media hosting. Email lists are a hassle. Imzy, a startup, places branding aesthetics over design usability. Where's the next place for fandom, or should we reclaim one or more of the platforms from the past?)

2018 - How to Tumblr (Like it or not (often, mostly not), tumblr is where fandom is most active right now. How do you find anything? How do you have conversations? How do you archive the bits you like best? The good news: the answers are not, "you don't; you don't; you don't." Bad news: Those aren't actually good questions for being fannish on tumblr.)

2019 - Social Network of Our Own (SNO3?) (Between FOSTA/SESTA, Article 13, Facebook's new "don't mention that sex exists" policy, and the Tumblrpocalypse, is it time for our own fannish social site? Or are Dreamwidth and Pillowfort enough?)

quick meta on engame

SPOILER WARNING THROUGHOUT !!

this meta assumes you've seen the movie so no background context provided, but once again: CONTAINS SPOILERS!  

this is a really rough first impression meta, mostly concerning steve, nat, bucky, sam, and tony bc i’ve still chewing on the rest. SO

1. sam offers to go with steve to return the gems, so it's clearly possible (suits & Pym Particles) for more than one person to go. bucky doesn't offer to go; bucky does not freak out when steve doesn't instantly return – because jfc, bucky already knew the plan (even if he looks like he's about to throw up w/ the stress caused by said plan). because steve fucking talked it over with him (bucky being the one, single person steve has ever been remotely accountable to in his life; the one person whose mental health he values more than getting to live his life, otherwise he wouldn't have gone with "bucky's still alive" as the ONE THING he knew he'd lose his own grip over mid-fight). Also, bucky would not be saying "go on" to Sam rather than stalking over there to clip steve upside unless they'd already had a conversation about who would be taking over the shield. even though they both know Sam is the only one remotely OK enough to do so, not giving buck first refusal fits... no facts or character development tbh.

why bucky did not, or did not want to, go back with steve is for someone else to write up.

2. why would anyone who knew about the plan be down with that plan, other than some trite BS about living out your best life? why would steve allow himself a free pass to do that, with premeditation, rather than staying in the future to fight alongside his team? (his need to heal is a whole different meta.)

maybe because that wasn't the only thing steve was going back in time to do?

3. you don't leave a teammate behind -- and you don’t trade lives. i can’t believe Steve spent a lifetime not doing anything to figure out how to make this a win for the people who lost.

nat couldn't be wished back to life due to the way she died. nor could gamora who died the same way. but both "past" gamora and "past" nebula die -- and yet their time-jumping selves are alive in the future.

steve turns back up in the future via living out those 70-odd years. So what happened to that spare time-travel suit and the Pym Particles he was carrying, eh? with all the trouble they had getting the gems due to lack of extra particles, and w/ sam's offer to go along, steve clearly had more pym particles on him than he'd strictly need just in case shit went wrong again. even if we say he only had exactly enough, and he used his last “get home” dose to jump from 1970 back to earlier, Hank Pym was alive and well and making more from 1970 at the latest. so what did he do with the suit, give it to goodwill?? like hell!

natasha. natasha romanoff happened to that suit. they built the friendship b/w nat and steve and they built it well. he wouldn’t abandon her so easy.

it’s possible she leapt to her death because she had foreknowledge that steve had-a-way for her to make it out, though I also believe she would do exactly the same without that knowledge (rage about that in a different post....) but if she did or didn’t know, there is still no way steve watched the Avengers doing their thing – knowing gamora's story -- with a spare time-travel suit in the basement and DID NOT pull nat out of the time-stream at some point before that.

(before that stops making sense, remember, if gamora is pulled into the future from morag, she nonetheless still “existed” in that past, because the snap still happens, which means she still died for the stone in the past of the future she jumped into. bruce explained it a lot better but. handwave, that’s the logic we’re given.)

so picture this: banner freaking out as an older, "doddery" steve shoos him away from the time controls and starts slowly, painstakingly inputting a bunch of what looks to be nonsense from a folded-up piece of graph paper. the machine kicks into life again. boom.  

there’s the suit and nat in the suit.

nebula was “sent forward” to input the data to bring thanos to the future. steve is doing the exact same thing in the same order.

4. why nat not tony? Because nat, dying the way she did, has far fewer options for survival. steve only knows one confirmed way to get around that, and this is it. ALSO because it's canonical that tony created multiple copies of his own consciousness and tony and bruce (with some help from Cho) have already managed to create bio-mechanical life w/ ultron and vision (so could bruce and/or shuri alone, since tony was clear in pointing out this is bruce's field and she...separated vision from an infinity gem like damn). mr “I Am Ironman” has switched out his plain-old biological body for a much less biological one (extremis, holograms, rebooting his corpse after erasing the hero register...) more than once through the years.

5. steve has decades married to the head of SHIELD and all their tech to plan how & when to cross paths with tony, probably post-ultron, in order to download and/or contrive to make a copy of tony's memory file. which he wouldn’t have been able to use or put into effect until he “returns” because tony was still alive until a few days before, but honestly --

6. when steve shows back up, he looks  ..... smug. his answer “I don’t think I will” is very self-satisfied. and while i don't doubt living his best life and years to heal help with that, he's re-united with friends who are still knee-deep in loss, and he's... smug?

the only reason i can see in that moment is because he's taken the limits of what they've got, the ¾ win, and he's managed to play that hand in a way that got a whole lot of something out of a whole lot of maybe. a life with peggy, managing to live long enough to still "be there" for everyone without them having a chance to miss him, handing over the shield, and a second shot at bringing two fellow soldiers home?

maybe, just maybe, that’s a GOOD reason to be smug. and a great reason for giving yourself permission to live.

7. i think steve just rebooted the concept of the secret avengers, and nat & tony are first up w/ bucky clearly in on the time-heist.

now i’m gonna go breathe into a paper bag a while and think about everything else but long live the new queen of Asgard, damn

7th

Again with this training activity hoping to wind up writing at a

That string of words couldn’t finish without violating my fram

That couldn’t too.

This is so hard!

My goal is making my writing b

Again! Fuck!

Must start from scratch.

I sit again typing with an aim of my writing quality rising. (Torturous, both how that sounds and doing this!)

Can’t go on, must go on, I’ll go on - I think that’s from a famous playwright. Good words to stand upon, to stay in motion, I think.

Honing a craft is in part putting hours. That’s what I’m doing now. Logging a bit of typing analogous to lifting or running. Also what I’m doing is adding in an additional difficulty so my brain must do additional work, hoping that pays off in a way. It’s taxing, anyway. I could do this six months (but could I...? I don’t know if I could, it sucks so much!) and that’s how I’ll know if it actually paid off. No shortcuts. Too bad!

That’s enough of that for today. That was really challenging. I’m going to do a Gatsby line in a moment. Is this any use? Are there other better things to do instead, or in addition? As ever I’m unsure. Keep going, just keep going. I should spend just a little time finding other exercises for the sake of the variation but I should also just commit to spending a large period of time on this as results come from large inputs of time really. Anyway, let me find Gatsby.

"the intimate revelations of young men, or at least the terms in which they ex- press them, are usually plagiaristic and marred by obvious suppressions.”

I wasn’t in bands for long and we didn’t play out much but when we did some of the best parts were the long drives. We had our upcoming show to look forward to or our recent show to recount, giving the social space inside the car a warm glow of shared purpose and a readymade set of references, small fragments of a script from which to improvise to keep moving together. We could stay in a chattering flow state similar to the better flow state of playing music. Being punks, we thought of ourselves as forging real connections through our refusal to wear the masks and go through the motions of society’s bullshit. Years later, embittered by how it all, and my years since, worked out - or didn’t - I looked back cynical about and impatient with younger us. We didn’t break from anything, just used different cliches from the standard ones, or used standard ones without realizing it - unwittingly stealing phrases we didn’t remember overhearing - and our connections were more transient and less honest than we thought: we still wore costumes, postured, preened, wanted to be looked at in specific ways rather than, as we pretended, just being ourselves. Years later still, (just) a little more at peace and (a lot) more resigned to my lot in life, I see younger us with more empathy and in greater context. Everyone speaks in borrowed phrases. We all see ourselves in mirrors built by - wearing clothes stitched by, selected with tastes shaped by - other people, and that’s fine. We were just getting used to our own capacity for self-making being (barely) ours, having been handed the keys to a limited extent in late adolescence. My empathy extends to the bitter older but now still younger me who rolled his eyes at our younger more punk selves. That me was trapped, frightened. I still am, but less loudly, maybe, or more numb, maybe. It seems to me self-making is significantly retroactive, a fashioning of a story from out past stories, and inflecting those stories by new juxtapositions and adding frame stories. This is the thought of an older person, a person whose Now is saturated with Then in a conscious way, while the younger person’s thought - I assert for effect - is a Now empty of Then partly through simply not having lived as long and so having few memories (I say this, though my Now has for as long as I can remember been easily crowded in by bad memories, if anything less so in my Now now than in my Now then), partly through force of will, and maybe partly though a greater skill or ability at shutting off, tuning in, locking out the noise and entering another kind of flow state, a presentness without self-awareness. Maybe I’m making that all up, I’m unsure. I think another part of it is in the social context, the setting of having others who support that past-less present and production of flow. I’m tempted to speculate on the truth and being of either - is there REALLY a present that is or isn’t saturated with the past? is the past REALLY still here? - but what’s the use. In any case we play the hand we’re dealt and that includes playing the game as well to some extent, whatever modifications and cheating and chivalrous dealings with other players we may be able to pull off on the way, and while the house has always won so far and while the game should abolished... well, again what’s the use? These lines lead astray, “they look the same - askance (excuse my failing sense of humor).” Is there a non-arbitrary stopping point for this, remembering it is after all just an exercise? Can I go meta, or transition out through rhetorical questions? Cheap, that, I think. Fine fine, call it a day, count these words as time in the chair, accumulating the hours that produce, I hope, greater skill over time. Can I loop it back to the beginning, tie the end in a bow with those car-ride conversations? Those were in a context of shared pursuit of all at once self-expression, self-discovery, connection with others, and improvement of artistic craft and output. All of that remains today, two Nows that rhyme I suppose, though less communal and less available in big chunks of time than back then, and I am happy to be in correspondence again with some of those old friends, themselves also working to keep a creative life. I don’t know if we’ll ever be on long car trips together again, I’m glad we once were and our connections were real even if they happened within known genres and tropes rather than being of our own making. I suppose I believe both that everyone is of their own making and no one is of their own making. I suppose as well that Marx said this better. When do the present and past add up and when are they subtracted? Who writes those problems we keep having to practice? Stop, stop.

Fandom 5k 2020

Showing up over a week late to the party.

Hey friend! So. Uh. About that letter…

Well, if you’re already on your way, that’s great!  Feel free to ignore this letter completely.  It is, after all, quite late.  If, however, you are like me and haven’t started yet, and you’re wanting a little something more for inspiration, here’s… something, at least. Most of this is in my signup, but there’s a bit extra here.

Good luck!

 General DNW

Rape/non/dub-con; non-canonical major character death; heavy angst; hurt no comfort; graphic depictions of deliberate and methodical self-harm*; graphic depictions of suicide; anything E rated; smut; gore; heavy gender dysphoria; grimdark; complete downer endings; character bashing; incest; cringe comedy; a/b/o; mpreg; unrequested full setting AUs (canon-divergence is fine); graphic eye trauma; graphic and/or permanent hand trauma (unless the setting can provide a more-or-less fully functional prosthetic or equivalent); issuefic; unrequested identity headcanons; a focus on unrequested romantic relationships.

*I don’t include things like, say, punching a wall in a fit of emotion under this. however, something like cutting would not be appreciated.

  General Likes

– I really like plotty fics

– Secret identity and disguise shenanigans, the more layers to them and more absurdity the better.

– Crossdressing for whatever reason and gender disguises, also for whatever reason.

– Time travel and time loops are always fun, especially as a fix-it.  I have a general preference for Peggy Sue style (aka, an older character getting put back in their younger body at an earlier point in the timeline) over the character’s physical body stepping back in time, but either one is good.

– A focus on family and/or friendship, especially characters realizing they’re not nearly as alone as they think they are, and just generally characters who like each other and enjoy spending time together

– Found family; families of choice

– Character studies

– Worldbuilding

  Fandom-Specific Things

 Original Works

Adolescent Supervillain with a Secret Identity & Adolescent Superhero with a Secret Identity

Child Superhero & Their Concerned Supervillain Nemesis

Male Student Mage Disguised as a Girl & His Older Female Mentor

Priestess Of A Dying Sun & Goddess Of Endless Night

Prophesied Hero & Prophesied Dark Lord

Prince/Prince of Enemy Country He’s Met on the Battlefield More Than Once

- Action/Adventure

- Character Development

- Interpersonal Drama

- Science Fiction

- Fantasy

- Hurt/Comfort

- Worldbuilding

 Fandom-specific DNW: neopronouns, random pronoun changes within a PoV (changing because of disguise purposes is fine, great even; I have a lot of trouble with characters who go by multiple pronouns within one PoV basically at random)

 Superheroes—for the kids with the secret identities, do they know each other as their civilian selves? As their cape selves? Both? Do they like each other, dislike each other, is this a rivalry thing… with stories that have this dynamic, I always end up spending half my time cackling internally and the other half of the time going children no when they’re friends as civilians and enemies in masks, but honestly I’d be here for any dynamic they could have. For the child hero and concerned nemesis, I absolutely adore the dynamic of the kid going “I’m here to defeat you!” and the villain being like “…okay I may be a criminal and a villain but you are a literal child what are you doing where are your parents,” and it going from there.

Student Mage & Mentor—ngl this is at least 85% inspired by all the “girl disguises herself as boy to become warrior” books I read as a kid, and I always wanted a gender-flipped version—so tell me! Why is he disguised as a girl? Does his mentor know? If she does, is she actively helping him, or begrudgingly accepting, or something else? Anything around this would be great, and ruse/identity reveals are always delicious if you want something more specific as a prompt.

Priestess & Goddess—I really like the idea of this; it has a very melancholic feel to it, like the end of an age, and I would love worldbuilding this place that allows this relationship, or a dual character study, or, of course, both.

Prophesied Hero & Dark Lord—I love explorations of fate and prophecy, especially in regards to people who are supposedly destined for roles they may or may not want—do the hero and dark lord know each other before the prophecy kicks off? How do they feel about their respective roles, and about each other? Is this a story where you can break from your role, or can you not fight fate? Are you destined to fulfil the prophecy, even if you try to defy it? I have no opinions on the gender of these characters—ignore the gender implications of the tag if you want to.

Prince/Prince—I’m picturing something with delicious snarky banter between the two princes. I’d love to see something with, like, a grudging mutual respect turning into something where they like each other and then they go and fall in love and go “oh… well, fuck,” and have to sort it out from there.

  The Dragon Prince

Aaravos

Claudia

Soren

- Character Development

- Worldbuilding

- Fantasy

- Fix-it fic

 Fandom-specific DNW: Aaravos/Viren, at all.

 This show is wonderful and heartbreaking and I adore it.

Claudia, Soren—I love them and am somewhat heartbroken over their choices this past season; I’d love any sort of character study focusing on them or their relationship to each other (and their dad, though I’d rather Viren not take the spotlight in any fic you write). After the show or during it, or something pre-canon—all of those are great. I’d definitely be down for things exploring the fallout of season three and the choices they made there, especially at the end.

Aaravos—I’m fascinated even as I somewhat dislike him. For him, I’d love to see something pre-canon—why did he get locked up in that mirror? What was the world like, when that happened? He’s our narrator at the beginning—what’s up with that? If you want to keep it more canon-era, I’d love a look into his head during the events that go down; what’s his angle on all of this? Is it just to free himself, or does he have broader plans? How much is he lying in all of this? For him, I’d be happy to get an outsider PoV or in-universe meta about him, especially on what he was before he got locked up—he’s in books! Clearly he wasn’t totally low profile back in the day.

  The Court Jester

Princess Gwendolyn/Sir Griswold

Hubert Hawkins/Maid Jean

Hubert Hawkins & Giacomo

Hubert Hawkins

- Character Development

- Getting Together

- Humor

 Fandom-specific DNW: Gwendolyn/Griswold relationship that isn’t reciprocal

 Okay, so, this has been a favorite movie of mine since I was like ten lol. I love it and its comedy and its characters and like… I mean. Look at my Thing for secret identity nonsense; it shouldn’t be hard to see the appeal here.

Gwendolyn/Griswold—so, Griselda tells Gwendolyn that she’ll marry for love. Now we all know that she doesn’t get to marry her jester; but who’s to say that she doesn’t end up marrying for love anyway? After all there’s no real other reason to pair her up with Griswold in the end; certainly there’s no longer a political advantage to be gained by doing so.

Hawkins/Jean—I like their dynamic, their mutual respect for each other’s skills and abilities, how they know each other and rely on each other and idk man I just want More.

Hawkins & Giacomo—this is a ridiculous prompt, in that they spend all of five minutes together before Giacomo gets knocked out (or is it killed? Not clear tbh) and disappears from the movie. I mostly think it would be really funny if somehow they had to drag Giacomo along? And then he’s trying to complete his original mission, but he and Hawkins have to pretend to be the same person, for Reasons, and… anyway I just think this would be very funny.

Hawkins—just give me anything about him; I’d be here for just about anything tbh, he’s great.  If you want something more specific, maybe tell me about his past, how he came to be part of the Black Fox’s group, or his childhood before that.

  現実もたまには嘘をつく | Genjitsu mo Tama ni wa Uso wo Tsuku | Sometimes Reality Tells Lies Too (Manga)

Terazaki Kaoru & Ousaka Shouko

Terazaki Kaoru & Ousaka Nanami & Takekawa Izumi

Terazaki Kaoru & Ousaka Nanami

Ousaka Nanami & Ousaka Shouko & Ousaka Toshio

- Character Development

- AU – Genre Shift

- Fluff

- Slice of Life

 Fandom-specific DNW: sexualization of Kaoru’s crossdressing, romance between Kaoru and Nanami beyond light shiptease à la canon, full justification of Kaoru’s fears re: Nanami’s dad

 I love these kids and their adorable friendship and character development. Honestly, anything you can give me with either of them I’ll probably treasure, since as far as I can tell this fandom is basically nonexistent. Some of my feelings here are just wordless warm fuzzy feelings but I will Try to give prompts.

So, for more specific ideas:

Kaoru & Shouko—I love how mom-like Shouko feels around Kaoru, and I’d love a deeper look into their dynamic. Half of me thinks she already knows or at least suspects that “Kaori” isn’t really a girl, or at least isn’t a cis girl, but I rather suspect she’d just not say anything, at least for the time being—“Kaori” is her daughter’s only friend, after all, and has been pulling Nanami out of her shell, and she wouldn’t want to disturb that.

Kaoru & Nanami & Izumi—these three are a lot of fun together, I’d love any sort of shenanigans with them, the more ridiculous the better.

Kaoru & Nanami—look they’re just. adorable. Anything exploring that friendship I am here for.

Ousaka family—I really like their dynamic. I’d be here for anything exploring it, really, including a look into Nanami’s backstory—it seems she wasn’t always as much of a shut-in as she is at the start, but there’s pain there too—what happened? I’d also find it quite funny if her parents have actually figured out Kaoru’s secret but aren’t going to let on to the kids just yet.

General things I’d be into seeing explored in anything with the relevant characters: Nanami’s past, Kaoru’s past/family/home life—he seems awfully lonely at times, do these kids… go to school? I kinda have the impression that Nanami doesn’t, but what do you think?, their mutual obsession with Peten-Chan

If you want to do a setting AU here I’d be down for that, as long as you keep the characters and their dynamics and don’t make it too dark.

  Thank you so much for writing for me and good luck with your writing!!

What is your biggest unpopular opinion with Banjo-Kazooie or Rare in general?

Yes. And I’ll probably get backlash, but as someone who has dealt with the Sonic fandom’s wrath with unironically liking certain characters more times than I could probably keep count of, I don’t really care.

Putting this under a cut, because it came longer than I thought it would.

Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts > Yooka-Laylee

I mean it, too, and not because I’m trying to be OMG EDGY either.

I don’t think that Yooka-Laylee is that good of a game. It’s a not a bad or terrible game, but it is still not a good one. If anything, it honestly feels generic as far as collect-a-thon platformers go.

Yes, they did a good job capturing the vibe and feeling of the Banjo-Kazooie games. But that’s it. The game is more or less style over substance. It’s pretty bare bones with an open world platformer as you can get, as far as the deeper aspects go. I felt like they took the elements they thought made Banjo-Kazooie and Tooie good, but only doing the bare minimum with it. The worlds are huge, but they usually feel pretty empty, or the areas blend in too much with each other instead of sticking out in their own way. The constant fourth wall jokes are honestly obnoxious, to the point where I think the developers were obsessed with themselves and thought that admitting the games flaws would make them go away. And yes, Banjo-Kazooie and Tooie regularly do fourth wall jokes, but it wasn’t no where near to that level of excessive or laziness. They actually did it when it was appropriate, instead of just doing it for the sake of it or to try and brush off flaws with the product.(That’s the problem I’ve been having with Fourth Wall humor lately.) The soundtrack also sounds like they were playing it safe, too. None of the tracks really stick out to me and they all just sort of blend into each other, all of them kind of sounding the same. It sounds like they told the composers, “Make music that sounds like Banjo-Kazooie.”, with no other direction, or giving it more of an identity outside of that. And as far as the gameplay itself goes, again, it feels like they took what made Banjo-Kazooie good but only did the bare minimum of it, and anything that was new was poorly implemented.

I think Yooka-Laylee basically mimicked Banjo-Kazooie on a superficial level. I feel like the developers took the good elements from the Banjo-Kazooie games, but they forgot why ‘said elements good and engaging in the first place. This honestly feels like, “Hey, remember how Banjo-Kazooie was thing? Well here is something similar to it, but without the fun and personality!”.

While definitely not on the same level as, Mighty No.9- at the end of the day, Yooka-Laylee just feels so bland and middle of the road. It’s just riding off of the coat tails of Banjo-Kazooie, and poorly so. And yes, it is meant to be spiritual successor to Banjo-Kazooie and Tooie. But, the point of a spiritual successor is to not only serve the same purpose as the series it’s acting as one to, but for it to also be it’s own thing and have it’s own identity, instead of relying so heavily on the nostalgia of the previous series. Yooka-Laylee fails to not only be it’s own thing, but it also fails at serving the same purpose as Banjo-Kazooie did as well. As far as I’m concerned, Yooka-Laylee is not a spiritual successor to Banjo-Kazooie and Tooie: It’s a cheap and disappointing substitute. You’re just better off going back and playing the Banjo-Kazooie games before it. It’s not good as a Banjo-Kazooie spiritual successor, and it’s not good as it’s own game. It feels uninspired and bare bones.

Fans can piss and moan, and cry and boo hoo about how oh-so “betrayed” they feel until the sun dies out. Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts, was actually a good game in it’s own right! Most importantly: I think it was actually fun to play! You know, that main thing you expect to have when you play a video game! I didn’t think I was going to enjoy it as much as I did when I first played it. I played the shit out of Jak II when it first came out, so I was able to easily get the hang of the game’s more open world, sandbox style of gameplay fast.

The whole gimmick with the vehicle building is actually more fun than I thought it was going to be, and I thought it was mostly implemented pretty well mechanic wise. Not only is the vehicle building gimmick actually pretty fun, but it’s also easy to learn and get the hang of, even if you’re not someone who is into that sort of gameplay mechanic(like me). Granted, customizing your own vehicles is actually optional, and you can always just use the standard vehicles provided to you. But the option to make almost whatever you want is still there, and I honestly think it adds so much more options and creativity for the game. And despite the vehicle mechanics being the main focus of the game, there actually are still some platformer elements; allot of them mostly involved scouring the the hub world and other worlds for either notes or vehicle parts. But there were also a good deal of side missions to do, as well. It felt like I was actually progressing through the game, and actually being rewarded for exploring every nook and cranny.

The hub world and the other worlds were big for their time. But, they made sure to fill them up with either worthwhile discoveries, or make them look unique and make each area stick out enough from each other.(Mostly.) I think Showdown Town is such a well designed hub world, and I like the hint of steampunk to it. Also, the use of vehicles actually made traversing around the hub world and other worlds easier and less of a slog, unlike if you were to do so purely on foot even with the use of warp pads. While most of the characters in the game are returning ones from the previous two games, I like most of the new ones that were introduced(especially Trophy Thomas) and I think they fit in pretty well among the previous cast of characters. And sans Banjo, Kazooie, and Mumbo, I actually think the redesigns for the returning characters are actually pretty good.(I think Bottles and Jolly have the best ones.)

While most of Nuts & Bolts’ soundtrack consisted of remixes or variations of older themes, the new tracks the game does introduce are genuinely good and unique, and they sound like they can belong alongside the older themes from the past games.

And you know what? I’d even go as far to say that, Nuts & Bolts, is even good as a Banjo-Kazooie game, even if from a meta and writing standpoint. Despite it being years since Tooie, and the game not being a traditional platformer, it still felt like I was seeing the same characters and their smart-ass selves, and the same witty writing from the last two games.

And yeah. Nuts & Bolts, does have flaws. The physics of the vehicles can be a little wonky at times, and the controls take time getting used to. The game can get repetitive at times, especially as far as the types of challenges normally offered throughout it. Some of the fourth wall jokes do become a little too much at times. And I honestly wish the game was a little longer than what it was. But these flaws are not enough to ruin the game for me. It’s still a competently made game, and a fun one at that. It’s still obvious that there was effort put into this game. And to be honest, I think this was Rare’s last good game.

It gets to me how perfectly good gameplay, concepts, characters, and designs, are immediately shit on or written off, just because bitter fans still can’t get the fuck over themselves and their poor wittle “betrayed” fee fees, simply because it turned out to not have the gameplay or mechanics they wanted or waited for. Then these same piss babies turn around and blindly eat up uninspired, coat tail riding games like Yooka-Laylee, just because, “Oh mah god! It plays like a platformer like the first two games. Mah nostaglia boner is so hard! And don’t you criticize it at all! It’s supposed to have all the flaws like an N64 game, dude!” Yeah, no. That shitty fucking, “But it’s supposed to bad!”, rebuttal is no excuse. We have learned allot since Banjo-Kazooie and Tooie, in terms of game design and shit. There is no excuse! You can still make an open world platformer and not make it boring or bland! Banjo-Kazooie and Tooie has, for most the part, aged pretty well, and I still enjoy them gameplay, atmosphere, and character wise, in spite of the aspects of it that haven’t aged well. That shit, “It’s supposed to be bad!”, excuse does not work for me! Neither does any rose tinted nostalgia vision. I do not like it when companies are obviously trying to manipulate with me nostalgia, in order to push their inferior product!

Also, even if this has nothing really to with Yooka-Laylee as a game itself. But, after seeing how some of the game’s staff treated their backers wanting a refund for them removing JonTron’s voice acting the game: Fuck them! Whether you like JonTron or not, or agree or disagree with the stupid he’s said, the way they basically mocked and talked shit about their backers on their Twitter, after they asked for a refund because they removed an aspect from the game that they paid for, was fucking disgusting! I loose all respect for a person the moment they treat their fans and supporters like shit! As someone who didn’t even back the game’s KickStarter- Fuck them! They can go fall off a fucking cliff for all I care! I’m glad their game ended up being a mediocre fuck heap, after that!

I wanted Yooka-Laylee to be a good game and revive the open world platformer. I did. But it’s not a good game. It’s just mediocre, and it doesn’t really stick out from the crowd, as far I see it. It just poorly relies on what made Banjo-Kazooie and Tooie fun and enjoyable in the first place. And I do not care if I get backlash for any of the things I just said above. Again, I’ve dealt with the Sonic fandom’s shit before.