Discover Top Posts Tagged with #big fan of dragons as a concept and in execution | Tumgag (2024)

The Next Dragon Age Has a New Title

byAuthor - BioWare-Posted on June 6, 2024

"Join us on Tuesday, June 11 for the Official Gameplay RevealHi everyone,Summer is nearly upon us,and as promised, we’re ready to provide an update on our big reveal. We’d like to invite the world to join us onTuesday, June 11,for the official first look at gameplay for the next Dragon Age!After Dragon Age: Inquisition launched, the studio was given an incredible opportunity to explore, test, and validate a variety of gameplay concepts as we worked to determine what the next Dragon Age could look like. We brought everything to the table which, yes, even included a multiplayer concept. The time we spent experimenting and iterating gradually taught us a lot. This work, and the amazing support from EA, helped us re-focus on creating an incredible single player game, with all the choices, characters and world building you’d expect from us.At BioWare, we create worlds of adventure, conflict and companionship, where you’re at the center of it all. As fans of our franchise know, every Dragon Age game has delivered a new standalone story. Set in the world of Thedas, these tales explore epic locales and threats, always thrusting you into a new conflict. Each game also introduces a new lead hero – The Warden, Hawke, The Inquisitor – that you can call your own. You can expect all that, and more, with the new game. And of course, much like your unique hero, it wouldn’t be a Dragon Age game without an amazing cast of companions – right?Each of the seven unique characters that make up your companions will have deep and compelling storylines where the decisions you make will impact your relationships with them – as well as their lives. You’ll unite this team of unforgettable heroes as you take on a terrifying new threat unleashed on the world. Naturally, the Dread Wolf still has an important part in this tale, but you and your companions – not your enemies – are the heart of this new experience.So, to capture what this game is all about, we changed the name as the original title didn’t show just how strongly we feel about our new heroes, their stories and how you’ll need to bring them together to save all of Thedas.We proudly introduce to youDragon Age™: The Veilguard.

We know you’ve been waiting a long time for this reveal and we’re so ready to show you what we’ve been up to. We’ll see you onTuesday, June 11th at 8:00am PT at theDragon Age YouTube channelwith over 15 minutes of gameplay from the opening moments of the game that has you jumping back into Thedas on your new adventure.This moment means so much to everyone at BioWare, and we wouldn’t be here without you. We’re ready to have some fun, so join the chat early…we’ve got a few special surprises for you.Thank you for all your support. See you soon,Gary McKayExecutive Producer, Dragon Age, and General Manager, BioWare"

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My Five Biggest Fears for Dragon Age: Dreadwolf

Dragon Age: Dreadwolf is highly anticipated by BioWare fans. At one point, I would consider myself to be excited for it too, however, unfortunately the long wait with zero information about the game has only wrecked my personal anticipation. Will my hype return once we actually start to get some regular news about the game? Most likely. But until that time comes, all I find myself doing is just… worrying.

These are the five biggest things I worry about.

5. Big, beautiful maps of nothing

In both Dragon Age: Inquisition and Mass Effect: Andromeda, most of the open world maps are very… empty. Instead of creating an adventurous feeling of excitement to explore, it just makes travelling those maps a tedious task. Games like The Elder Scrolls: Skyrim or the new Baldur’s Gate 3 have open maps too, but those developers actually made use of their space with level designs. Skyrim is full of caves, ruins, etc. content to stumble upon. So is BG3, as well as introducing new dynamics to a fight depending on which direction you approach the encounter from. These games prove an understanding of how to best equip an open world concept that BioWare has only executed in a few maps across both their most recent RPGs. I do not want to see Dragon Age: Dreadwolf be yet another case of luscious forests where developers spent far too much time making look visually beautiful, and not enough time actually filling with game content.

4. Shoddy attempts at retcon

For those of you who don’t know what “retcon” means, it is short for “retroactive continuity”, and refers to the phenomenon of fiction introducing new information that is inconsistent with past information. The purpose is to revise old material. Dragon Age: Inquisition had more than one attempts at retcon that were terribly executed. For example, the player is told not once, not twice, but three different times—as if repeating it enough will erase all the extensive lore up to that point saying otherwise—that the Dalish get rid of their mages if they have “too many”. This is despite the previous games and extended materials showing that the Dalish practically revere their mages.

Now, not all retcons are bad. For example, in Marvel Comics, the superhero Karma’s real name was recently retconned to be Xuân Cao Mạnh, a real Vietnamese name, after spending years and years with the made-up Vietnamese name, Xi'an Coy Man. This is an example of how retons can be used for a good purpose, like fixing a long-lasting mistake. But what exactly is the mistake in saying the Dalish are good people who don’t hate mages like most of Thedas? That was just a cheap, transparent excuse to villainize both elves and mages further.

Cheap, transparent excuses like that make me lose faith in BioWare’s writing. It concerns me with what other lore they view as needing “correcting” in order to reinforce their idea of Grey Morality™ where it doesn’t belong.

3. Imposter characters

One of the biggest grievances I had with Dragon Age: Inquisition, was how the Hawke written in that game was in no way the same Hawke I played in Dragon Age II. I understand that it would be impossible to capture the exact customized character, but the Hawke in DA:I was placed into the game with an anti-blood magic agenda, and wouldn’t shut up about it. This is hilarious, considering how many players chose to make their Hawke a blood mage personally!

With this in mind, I am terrified that my Inquisitor, who will very likely make an appearance in Dragon Age: Dreadwolf, will be used for whatever new agenda needs to be pushed. I better not hear a single anti-Dalish comment from my Lavellan, is all I’m saying.

2. Whitewashing ahoy

For all the talk about #diversity values, BioWare has a very extensive criminal record when it comes to whitewashing their own characters. Almost every single one of their most prominent visibly non-white characters have had their skin lightened or completely washed out, as well as ethnic features erased, at some point or another. This is why I cannot share any excitement or desire for existing characters to make a return; the fear that we’ll have to see Zevran next looking like Chris Hemsworth next haunts me too much.

But this particular fear runs even deeper than individual characters. Why? Because we know that Dragon Age: Dreadwolf will be taking place in northern Thedas, which up to this point has been consistently depicted as having largely non-white demographics. I’m not saying there are no white people in Tevinter, Antiva, etc., but I am saying that if I see the same mix of 80% pale tones and 20% “everyone else” we’ve gotten from the last three games, I will absolutely flip sh*t. White characters should be in the minority for a change. Otherwise, what is the point of shifting focus away from the dominantly white countries in the first place?

1. This will end of the Dragon Age franchise

Is this the most likely to happen of all fears? No; it is probably the least. But after the pathetic failure that was Anthem and the lacklustre response to Mass Effect: Andromeda, I would not be surprised if BioWare is on thin ice in EA’s eyes. (Which is ironic, considering the demands made by EA to chase after multiplayer fads and micro-transactions are what got BioWare into such a mess in the first place.) Electronic Arts is a garbage company run by garbage people. That much has been proven time and again. The executives behind BioWare itself aren’t clean, either. Unfortunately it will be average employee that suffers the most punishment and blame if the game does not meet the likely very high standards set out for it. In some ways, they are almost set up to fail.

It’s not fair, and there’s not we can really do about it, because the gaming industry is run by selfish idiots. It’s because of this that if events come to pass that the Dragon Age franchise was put “on hold indefinitely” so BioWare can work on clunking out an Anthem sequel, I would be very upset, but not very surprised.

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FH Junior Year Post-Season Thoughts

With another season of Fantasy High in the books and my recaps all finished, I wanted to do an overview of my thoughts on the season as a whole. Even though I feel generally positive about my experience with the season, there are a few things I think maybe could have been done differently narratively or mechanically. This isn't to criticize the way the season went down or to backseat DM/Play. More my combined ten years of college for textual analysis and storytelling bleeding through, haha.

I first want to start with the things I thought worked really well.

Fantasy High has "High" right in its title but, in past seasons (and especially Sophom*ore Year), not as much time as you'd think was spent actually at school and even if it was spent at school, there wasn't much time spent in class or engaging with the realities of being a student. This season really dug into the academic consequences of skipping your classes all the time and the realities of needing to do a ton of extra stuff to try for a scholarship and I think that was a refreshing thing to highlight for a change. Being more scared at flunking out than the dragon that's trying to eat you feels very emotionally resonant. Real "High School Is Killing Me" vibes for anyone who's a fan of NPMD.

Even though Fantasy High is a show that has some deep emotional beats and strong character arcs, it's first and foremost a comedy show. From the jump, everyone was generating bit after bit that had me cracking up as usual. "Little girly dog collar" is one of the funniest combinations of words I can think of. I think it was Siobhan who said that this was the goofy season and, having seen it, I'd have to agree with her. It never failed to make me laugh and it was always a highlight of my week. The cast just has great table chemistry that I love to watch no matter what they're doing.

Watching some of these high level combat encounters is as close as I'll get to understanding people watching sports. Even though combat is generally my least fave part of D&D, I think the cast really killed it this season with how cleverly they played and Brennan came up with some really great combat encounters. Special shout outs to Baron's Game and The Last Stand for their unique mechanics.

This is going to be one that's on the other list as well because my feelings are mixed, but I genuinely do like the downtime mechanic and how it forces hard choices. I think it's an interesting way to connect a mechanic to the story and cultivate stressful atmosphere for the season.

I have problems with the execution but I love the Rat Grinders in concept. I think as early as season 1 I was hoping that we'd meet a party that was like the Bizarro Bad Kids and the idea of a party that's farming XP instead of going on crazy adventures is a strong concept. Likewise, I think a character that's jealous because of your "cool" (read: tragic) backstory is also a fun trait for an unhinged antagonist in this kind of setting.

This is me absolutely showing my bias but I adored the Abernant Sisters content this season. I dunno if Siobhan specifically asked Brennan to not put her on a bus with the other beloved NPCs or what but I'm so glad she stuck around and we got the development we did. It was almost entirely ancillary to the plot but there was this clear pattern of Aelwyn getting softer and sweeter towards Adaine over the course of the season, from the guarded, "Enjoy the nemesis ward," to, full I love you's and, "I'd take them to get you." It was way more focus than I expected considering that Aelwyn completed the bulk of her arc last season and a lot of the time, a redemption arc basically ends after the big gesture (in this case, Aelwyn taking a magic blast for Adaine in Sophom*ore Year). So the fact that we got to see all of these sweet moments of them reestablishing their relationship outside of do or die moments was such a pleasant surprise. Again, I fully admit I am extremely biased, but this was my top wishlist item and the season overdelivered so there's a baseline happy I'm always gonna be with Junior Year.

OK, so moving on to things I things I think could have been tweaked.

Even though I liked the downtime system and the pressures it created, it also squeezed out the chance for more casual PC to NPC interactions that would usually be more common because they were semi-locked behind the relationship track and there wasn't an obvious benefit to roll for Relationships (as opposed to something like Academics which was crucial for not flunking out). Making the mechanical benefit more clear would have helped that (even if it meant Brennan didn't get his reveal--which he ended up just telling them anyway so might as well do it early). The other thing is that the consequence of a rage token was so bad that of course they spent all season avoiding getting one. Things might have gone differently if the consequences had been a bit more obscured, like in Neverafter. And it could have been a nice parallel to the Rat Grinders to take this unknown resource that makes things easier for you but is also having this negative effect. Then it could be like dang we did the same thing they did unknowingly.

I mentioned this in my recap but I'll talk about it again. It is a little confusing to me that we did the Ankarna subplot right after we did the very similar Cassandra subplot. It took up so much time this season which I don't think is an issue in and of itself, it's just that we literally just went through some extremely similar beats last season. Why double up on this same storyline when there's so much new ground to cover? Or if we're going to raise a god, why not make it a different kind of god? One theory I had early on was that the Rat Grinders were trying to raise their own god to one-up the Bad Kids but instead of raising a chill, misunderstood Cass type, they accidentally raised a god who was erased for a good reason and got in over their heads.

It's fun for there to be connections between seasons but sometimes it's like, OK that's a *lot* of coincidences. Like the god who your rivals is trying to raise *happens* to be the wife of your cleric's god and also *happens* to be the god of the fiend trapped in your friend's mom's chest and that fiend *happens* to be the relative on your bard's dad's side which is *also* the reason she is randomly cursed? That's a LOT of red string connecting plot points. As unhinged as Kipperlilly is about coveting Riz's backstory if I saw that go down I'd be like you have *got* to be kidding me.

The mystery elements didn't feel like they clicked as well as they did in other seasons. I think that's partially because Porter's plan was so convoluted (seriously, I made another post about how haphazard his plan was) and had all these moving parts and we didn't get clear answers for a lot of mechanical things like how the rage crystals actually work and when they were implanted and stuff. You had stuff like Devil's Honey which I think is super cool as a thing that exists in the world but ended up being an element that just led the players down the wrong path and had a relatively small payoff (that Porter was using it to lie to Ankarna). I think it's plausible that a forgotten god would be willing to listen to anyone saying the right things without introducing this element. (As opposed to, for instance, Ambrosia which has a very clear connection to what's going on and is a solid clue that someone is flirting with aspirations of godhood.)

The Porter reveal came so late in the season that even though it was a fun/challenging fight, there wasn't a lot of emotional weight behind killing him. It was basically just dunking on a teacher Fig has always hated who was also mean to Gorgug so screw him. Which, valid of course. But the Bad Kids were never going to react as strongly to Porter as they were to the Rat Grinders so putting Porter in the prime villain spot isn't necessarily what I would have done if I wanted the fight to be more than just a brawl--especially since we've done "School admin with student minions" already in S1. I don't mind the full circle callback but it would have been nice to pick something else for the sake of variety. We haven't had a child mastermind yet and I think Kipperlilly could have been a great candidate for that. My friend suggested that it would have been fun if Kipperlilly was trying to become a god instead of just being Porter's underling and I agree. "I'm not anyone's chosen one so I'll choose myself," is still within her established jealousy and Type A tendencies. If we want to keep Porter involved since that was Brennan's gift to Emily, maybe have it be that instead of Kipperlilly working for him, he's working for her. Like Artemis Fowl vibes! And the Rat Grinders can be varying levels of on board--from true believe to redeemable. I don't think Brennan planned for the Bad Kids to ever redeem her so might as well go full megalomaniacal mastermind with her and make her The Villain if she's not gonna be nuanced anyway. If My Little Pony can do it and send a literal child to Tartarus for pony treason (or whatever Cozy Glow did), Fantasy High can too.

Continuing from the above, if we have the Porter fight in place of the Grix fight (a la Daybreak) and don't use Ankarna, that gives way more time for the Bad Kids to investigate the Rat Grinders throughout the season and it would mean that they would have their personalities developed a lot more. With the limited downtime, they Bad Kids didn't have a lot of time to spend on these kids who were just hating on them for no good reason (valid). But if you cleared their plate of the god hunt stuff, they'd have more time for this. And if they weren't all rage zombies to varying degrees, it would be easier to see them as characters. Besides Kipperlilly (and, funnily enough, Mary Ann) we don't really have a good read on what these kids are actually like. The little time we spent with them all season was kind of a wash if them breaking out of rage means their personalities got laundered too. Anyway, regardless of how their loyalties ended up shaking out, it would have been fun for them to be more than the minions that they were in canon. As funny as it is for them to just kinda be XP farming losers, they did have the potential to be more interesting in their own right if they weren't just Porter's minions. And again, we've done adults forcing or coercing children into being minions in Freshman and Sophom*ore Year already. Lemme see some self-created child maniacs! (Or, peer pressured child maniacs. That's cool too. The Lucy/Kipperlilly dynamic is way more interesting to me if it's like girl, I would take a bullet for you but I CANNOT walk this path with you any further in response to *I* will be a god and you can be *MY* champion.)

Anyway, those are my thoughts! LikeI said, I have my points that I think could have been tightened, but overall an enjoyable season and I will be glued to my screen if they decide to close out with Senior Year!

Fantastic Rants and Where to Find Them

So, back when the Herbie Porber movies were still being made, Warner Brothers saw the cash cow on their hands and decided they had to lock that sh*t down as much as possible to make sure they could milk it until its teats were chafed and withered to nothing. To that end, they bought the rights to every book the Terf Queen had written by that point - which included all the Henry Pansley wizard school mystery books, but also two gag books set within the Henry Pansley world: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, which was presented as an in-universe biology textbook for wizard children, and Quidditch Through the Ages, which was an in-universe book of trivia for a fake magical sport.

And at the time everyone with a brain who'd read those two books was shaking their head and thinking how dumb those corporate executives were to do that because, like, those aren't novels or novelas or short stories or narratives of any kind. They are, and I cannot stress this enough, a fake textbook and a fake trivia book about fake things written in a slapdash manner as a cheap gag. They existed for three reasons:

First, to sell something Herbie Porber related at a significantly lower price point than the actual novels so the Terf Queen could get more of that sweet, sweet Scholastic Book Fair money by having something poor kids could buy.

Second, to give a portion of the proceeds raised from that poor kid book fair money to charity so the Terf Queen could get some nice tax writeoffs.

And as a distant third, to expand the world-building of the Henry Pansley setting a teensie bit.

Now, as far as I'm aware, they succeeded at the first two well enough - tons of kids bought those cheap-ass thin as sh*t paperbacks when I was a kid, myself among them. Well, ok, I only bought Fantastic Beasts and skipped Quidditch because even during the height of my Herbie Porber fan days I thought the Terf Queen's imaginary sport was really f*cking stupid and every time it popped up in the books I was bored as sh*t and tried to skim it as quickly as possible to get to the interesting stuff. I think I looked over the book once in a Barnes and Noble and thought, "Wow, I knew I thought real sports were boring as sh*t, but it turns out fake ones are even more so."

But back on track - goal number three was... kind of successful, I guess? Like, I don't know if you know this, but bestiaries of fictional animals are one of my big interests. I love a big book of made up creatures, and have collected many in my long life of thirty-four years. And as I said, I got a copy of Fantastic Beasts - technically several, because those cheap ass paperbacks disintegrated if you read them more than once, and I haven't met a bestiary that I haven't poured over several times, no matter how sh*tty. And despite how often I read it, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them was, well... pretty mid, honestly. It's a book that's 99% world-building, and like all of the Terf Queen's world-building, it's overall mediocre and undercooked.

Like, in pure Herbie Porber style, it's mostly concepts that have been done in fantasy fiction and mythology dozens of times before with no real original spin on them whatsoever, often stripped down to their most recognizable elements alone. There are a smattering of original ideas that are actually interesting an novel, a few more original ideas that have potential but don't seem very well-thought out as is, and then some that are clearly just there to be a joke and are amusing for, like, a second, but also would quickly become annoying if they were given any focus.

I'll give a very me-specific example. As a fan of vaguely medieval european fantasy tropes, one of the metrics by which I judge a bestiary is "How does this handle dragons?" Because, like, I don't know if you know this, but I love dragons a lot, and the sheer variety of dragons in fiction is one of my favorite things in the world. There is a smorgasbord of different dragons a person can choose from just in folklore and mythology alone, and that variety is reflected in a given bestiary, the higher I think of it.

The Terf Queen's bestiary gives us ten dragon breeds... and they're all more or less the same except for scale color and minor variations in size. Oh, and their names, which are all based on different dog breeds because the Terf Queen thought that was funny. It's the worst of both worlds because it gets your dragon-loving hopes up that there'll be lots of unique dragons but no, they're just different colors, ho hum. Even the Chinese Dragon sticks to the same basic bitch wyvern body plan as the rest, when, you know, Chinese dragons have SUCH a different body plan than any of their European counterparts. It's downright insulting to the variety and creativity of this iconic folkloric archetype to reduce it to such a samey-set of monsters. Absolutely the most disappointing dragon entry in any bestiary I've ever read, just infuriating.

BUT, BACK ON THE INCREASINGLY DERAILED TRACK: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them was never meant to be a "great" book. Remember goals one and two: it was a cheap cashgrab, a gimmick, a gag book. It was meant to be a disposable bit of fun - "Tee hee, here's a goofy textbook from this goofy wizard story that you kids will likely grow out of in a few years, you can read it in twenty minutes and not feel bad when you pitch it because there's very little substance to it, and it only costs three bucks."

The Terf Queen doesn't write textbooks, gag or otherwise, she writes novels, narratives, and in its original form Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them was clearly just her f*cking around with something whimsical and stupid for sh*ts and giggles (and money, sweet sweet money). The original version of it was published with notes in the margin written by Henry Pansley and Donnie Stoat themselves, the two wizard hooligans writing little jokes and messages to each other with further references to other characters from the series, both to add more humor and because, again, the Terf Queen writes novels, and it was clear she couldn't commit to the "fake textbook" bit without working in some characters riffing it for her own sanity. And that makes it work as a gag book - you get a few laughs from the wizard hooligans playing MST3K with their sh*tty textbook, learn a little about the (undercooked and poorly thought out) ecosystem of the wizardy world, and then when you reach the back cover the spine of your cheap as sh*t pulp paperback book falls apart and, unless you've got a weird obsession with bestiaries, you throw the dying book in the garbage without a second thought. Three bucks spent well enough.

BUT, TO GET BACK ON THE INCREASINGLY DERAILED TRACK AGAIN: Warner Brothers bought the rights to this cheapo cashgrab gag textbook, and goddamn it, they were/are determined to squeeze Herby Porber's sore teats until every last drop of money milk spills from his chapped and bleeding nipples. They announced they were going to make a Fantastic Beasts movie towards the end of making the Herby Porber novels into films, and everyone with a brain sat there and thought, "Well, that's going to be a stupid cashgrab. Bet the Terf Queen's laughing her ass off at how dumb it'll be, too."

But the Terf Queen was not laughing, at least not for long, for once the Henry Pansley movies wrapped up, she was left with the horrifying knowledge that people didn't care for her non-wizard books all that much, certainly not enough to keep her rolling in sweet, sweet money. She needed that mega millionaire cash, and she needed it in abundance and she needed it quick. So when Warner Brothers asked her to write a movie based on her cheapo cashgrab gag textbook, she said, "Yeah, I can make a novel out of that! I - I'm a talented writer! People love my writing! They definitely love my writing and they'd love to pay money for things I wrote that don't directly feature Henry Pansley!"

So now she had to pretend that Fantastic Beasts, the cheapo cashgrab gag textbook about made up animals in a made up world, has a narrative. Not just any narrative, but a grand, sprawling narrative, one to rival, nay, SURPASS Herbie Porbie and the Seven Books of Wizard-Themed Coming of Age Nonsense. Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, she assured us, was to be a magnificant tale, and one she planned all along, and CERTAINLY not a marriage of convenience to a completely stupid idea for a film that she was desperately sculpting into a narrative it had no ability to support for the sake of trying to recapture her already passed glory days as a writer.

And I think, in retrospect, this is a great illustration of the Terf Queen's great character flaw. She just can't f*cking admit to a mistake, even when it's obvious to everyone that one was made. She will hop on board a sinking ship and keep doubling down on trying to get it to sail even as the water is up to her neck. Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them is a serious narrative now, not a gag textbook written to wring a few more dollars from school children goddammit!

Recent editions of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them took out the Herbie and Donnie commentary, by the by. They also added many of the new half-baked monsters that were introduced in the movies, in a shoddy attempt to pretend this was the plan all along, and that Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them was always meant to be the seed of something great.

But it wasn't, and no matter how hard the Terf Queen pretends otherwise, it's obvious it wasn't. It's a cheapo cashgrab gag textbook, and that's all it really had to be, until greed and ego demanded otherwise.

You said that the execution of S4 failed, so how should it have been or what were the steps that should be followed? Genuine interest. Might help anyone who is writing about Jttw.

Basically: Extraordinary twist requires extraordinarily good explanations, and the big honcho of the Celestial Realm getting killed by a Bodhisattva's cat is one such twists. Yet it isn't explained properly other than JE's vague statement that "his time is up".

(Is this an attempt at alluding to the concept of "Peril" (劫), something even immortals and celestials must endure in order to continue existing, and the Buddhist idea that beings of the Path of Heaven are still not free from the cycle of life and death, however near-infinite their lifespan is?)

(If so, then SAY IT.)

But my biggest issue is the huge Show-not-Tell problem regarding the corruption of the Celestial Realm.

Like, due to the influence of 1961 Havoc in Heaven and the "SWK as peasant rebel" reading that became the dominant narrative during the Maoist era, the Celestial Realm ("feudal" regime), as well as the Buddha and the Buddhist pantheon (religion), get demonized a lot in Chinese JTTW media.

Through that lens, Havoc in Heaven is the story of a grassroot hero fighting against a huge, ancient, corrupt institution, and either winning or losing, and even when he loses, it's the crushing of a revolutionary martyr by the old reactionaries: tragic, but the nobleness and righetousness of his goal is never in doubt.

(I dislike the "class warfare" reading too. A lot, in fact. But that's a story for another day.)

Which is what LMK S4 seems to be going for…and where it flounders.

Like, a Chinese viewer has that context, because most of our popular JTTW adapations dial up the Celestial Realm's prejudice against SWK and its corruption to some extent, as a justification for Havoc in Heaven.

A western viewer who hasn't watched the '61 film, or the '86 TV show, or the '99 cartoon, doesn't have that context, and LMK's oddly empty Celestial Realm that seemed to be populated entirely by Nezha, JE and nameless NPC soldiers doesn't help in the slighest.

(As a JTTW novel liker, my personal opinion is that book!Celestial Realm, even though it is not cartoonishly evil, still sucks ass, and the JE is a typical, mediocre dynastic ruler who's good at upholding the status quo, but extremely petty and vicious to subjects who have personally offended him, like Sha Wujing or the governor of Fengxian Prefecture.)

(They did show more leniency to SWK pre-Havoc in the book than in most modern adaptations, however, despite their f*ck-ups.)

And that's how you get fans claiming "SWK never wants the Havoc in Heaven!"

After all, we haven't seen the Celestial Realm being assholes, or, y'know, subjecting a prefecture to an eternal-in-all-but-name drought until people sold their children for three bushels of grains and were driven to cannibalism, because the governor spilled JE's offerings and fed them to the dogs (novel canon, btw), and Nezha seems like a nice guy! How bad could the regime be, really?

Like, you can absolutely show a rebellion falling apart, becoming corrupted from the inside, causing just as much damage to the commoners as the regime they are fighting, and rebels who are far from heroic.

Or how popular rebellions like these were against the corrupt officials and laws, but seldom the emperor himself, and even those that did aim at deposing an emperor were about putting their guy of choice on the dragon chair, instead of dealing away with the dynastic system itself.

Yet the grievances behind those rebellions were also 100% real. The corruption, the abuse of power, the massive human sufferings that led to armed uprisings thoroughout Chinese history, many of which failed while others became the last straw that toppled a dynasty.

And that part, I feel, is neither shown well nor explored properly.

Feelings on Xicor and DB AF as a whole!

Posting a thread I had back on Twitter here, though I'll be expanding on a fair bit since I have MUCH more room to breath so, let's get into one of my favorite subjects in this fandom, AF fan culture!

The fandom in the 2000s is really fascinating to me as someone who wasn't "there", the show and manga were 100% DEAD, there were only games that retold the same story from Z to GT during that time and yet because of a certain localization that was happening the fanbase was kinda thriving, constantly making new stuff. There was ZERO actual new story content and yet the fans just took it upon themselves to make sh*t and keep that flame going! New transformations, endless sagas, whole multi work fan manga that just spawned from a dead series that happened to get an English Dub with a different soundtrack.

Arguably at the center of most of this was this guy right here, XICOR, third son of Goku and the main villain of AF (or at least, it's first arc.). People talk about how a character like Xicor is rather boring and yeah that is true, the character of Xicor is boring, but it's not he himself that's the fun part, it's what he represents that makes him interesting!

He's undeniably fascinating if ya think about it.

His design? Ripped from a fan form. This pic is from like, 04' if I recall correctly and it's not even a new character, it's Goku in Super Saiyan 9. That's why he has Goku's Gi but green, the spikes are there cause apparently it's a dragon form??? Who'd have thunk it eh?

His character? Basically every villain that came before him and then some, a high and mighty powerhouse with an ego to match. Eager to take the throne atop the universe where his father supposedly sat as West Kai had told him. Ruthlessly evil to his core and merciless, in other words, very generic.

His backstory? A hodgepodge of several different fanfics from around the same time that combined into what we know now. The illegitimate third son of Goku, born of West Kai and Goku's DNA because she had taken his blood (or seduced him depending on the fic!).

It's just endlessly interesting what he represents, he feels less like a real character to me and more like an icon. Something that embodies DB's OC culture and general fandom in a lot of ways, whether the fans would admit it or not, he's a mainstay in this fandom that won't go away. No matter how far removed we get from that era.

And that's not even getting into the story he's attached to, or rather the concept. DRAGON BALL AF, After Future! Or perhaps it's April Fools? AF is never concrete. It could be anything and everything. It's far beyond what it originally was, beyond what the creator of that "SSj5" image intended. Hell, it's not SSj5 at all, it isn't even Goku! But as far as the fandom is concerned, that didn't really matter.

What had originally began as one fan story, one image really, eventually became something that would define basically any Post GT story line. A lot of them having similar elements with wildly differing execution, from Goku's third son to Cellbuuzer or any manner of unholy creations one could dream up in their heads.

I think to some degree everyone involved in spreading the idea around knew it wasn't "real" but there's something insanely cool about how it became this big community fan project with ideas anyone could use in their own stories.

I honestly can't speak to the quality of AF Origins cause I've never read it myself but Toyble and Jiji's AF Doujinshis are probably the most well known versions of the story aside from maybe PGV's take, but I can't speak on that either cause it's insanely long and it's lore is.. complicated to put it lightly.

Toyble's version of the story takes the Xicor premise and runs whole hog with it, the majority of Xicor's agreed upon characterization is found here and the action is a damn fun read if you're into this kinda thing.

The real highlight is probably the art and what little bits of humor are present, it feels very Toriyama like at it's best and I've no doubt it's why he landed a job doing official work.

It's a darn shame that it never truly finished but the ending we did get was kinda sweet and I'm more than happy with that.

Jiji's AF is a lot longer and has the benefit of actually being finished, with multiple arcs that are quite fun. The highlight is probably the story with Marble and seeing Goten, Trunks and Uub handle a threat on their own.

The last arc being a repeat of the Shadow Dragons is not my favorite conceptually and their designs even less so but it's really nifty to see everyone handle their own Dragon so, I give it a pass.

Both are rife with heavy amounts of ripping shots from the original manga and tracing in some instances but I can't say I'm too bothered by it. As they're still fun to see as real takes on AF in some form. There's definitely better fan manga out there but these are the ones I wanted to highlight.

There's so many more fun and bizarre things from this era of DB's fandom history that I wanna highlight and go in depth on but I'd be here for a million years if I did so I'll leave on this:

I honestly believe there's no fandom that's like Dragon Ball's, Sonic's fandom is close, but that was never a dead franchise. This fandom can be annoying, offensive and quite unfun sometimes, but I adore it at it's best. It's a wildly interesting ride I'm happy to be part of!

Ok Godzilla fan brainrot moment?

I think there's a lot of untapped potential in depicting Ghidorah as anything other than a wyvern. His name says he's supposed to be a hydra, so that's why he's always depicted as a three-headed monster, but the most consistent depiction of him has two hind legs and two wings, like a traditional wyvern.

Pretty much all the monsters in the original Showa era movies have some sort of vaguely humanoid shape so they could be suits worn by a single actor, even though Ghidorah had to be puppeteered by several more people outside of the costume. I assume his original body shape was partly chosen for the sake of practicality, since giving him four legs plus wings would have made the acting even harder to coordinate.

However, the recent american depiction of the character even had him looking more wyvern-ish and animalistic, using his wings as forelegs to walk at times. Normally, his characterization as an animal/monster controlled by a higher power wouldn't clash with this creative choice, but in that movie (King of the Monsters) he's the actual controlling force. Not a big deal, but it's a curious evolution.

I'm not an expert in old folklore, but at least in modern media, both classic western (four legs plus wings) and eastern (serpentine, typically smaller limbs and no wings) dragons are usually depicted as more intelligent and powerful than wyverns (who I believe weren't even able to breathe fire traditionally?) so I thought that would be an easy next step for the character.

Don't get me wrong, it's been done before. Not that long ago, I thought The Planet Eater chose to go for a more eastern-looking form for the guy, since he's seemingly depicted as some sort of multi-dimensional snake with several heads and we only saw his traditional silhouette in a sort of dream.

But not only did I find this promising beyond-human-comprehension threat disappointing in its execution, turns out he's actually the same he's ever been. That dream wasn't just a reference for fans, it's how he actually looks, confirmed by merchandise and concept art. Shame. The chinese long Ghidorah well is officially left unexploited.

However, there have been a couple of four-legged, european style depictions. The first one is the overlooked and underappreciated Death Ghidorah/Desghidorah from Rebirth of Mothra. He looks absolutely incredible, exactly as threatening as his name implies.

The one "however" to this is... it's canonically a different character, a relative of the original King. Very close, but as I said, it's an obscure character that only made one film appearance and gets very little attention.

The second one I remember is Kaiser/Keizer Ghidorah, the true form of Monster X, seen in Final Wars, as a proper last opponent in an all-out anniversary movie. He's pretty much everything I just said I want to see.

You could argue that with a different name comes a different character, the wiki certainly treats him as such, and Ghidorah never had this Monster X, held-back form. The closest thing were the Heisei era Dorats that mutate into Ghidorah, obviously a much different thing. As for myself, I think he's perfect. A concept I want to see coming back in the future, just like Mechagodzilla finds ways to keep coming back in very different contexts.

I guess that's the point of this kinda long post. I got caught in the thought that, despite being Godzilla's arch-nemesis, the final boss of the franchise, despite all the decades of film-making and storytelling, there's still so much room for growth and re-imaginings. Pretty cool stuff I think.

What is the MCSM Rewrite Project?

It's exactly what it sounds like!

I'm making what is essentially a new version of Minecraft Story Mode. The characters will be reimagined, keeping core elements alive, but making them overall... better. I believe the original MCSM had a lot of potential, but fell flat in execution. I am attempting to rectify that, more or less, but in book format.

The Important Bit

I'm posting this on tumblr just to sort of say "Hey, I'm making this thing. I think it's really cool, and any ideas would be appreciated." So, that's that! I'm looking for some ideas. Specifically ideas for episodes 6-8.

Things I have planned and established already:

Jesse is nonbinary. It makes sense considering I'm adapting a game to a book.

The main cast are actually competent. Because there's no reason for them to act like they've never existed in this world when they've been here for forever?

Servers exist. This is most important for the second arc (Eps 5-8). I've got some information established regarding servers, but basically all that I'll say here is that they vary in game mode, how many people live there, server operators, and some of them may even be modded.

About episode six... No, I'm not doing the YouTuber cameo thing. I am using original characters for this part of the arc, specifically mine and some friends'.

What about season two? I haven't officially decided if I'm doing anything for the second season. I probably will. But for right now most of my focus is on season one. That being said, I have done some thinking on it thanks to my good friend. We'll see where it goes.

Also, custom skins are going to be a thing. Not nearly enough completely inhuman characters in this game. I've even got it planned how they create these custom skins as well.

The big threat is also different. So I sort of replaced the Wither Storm as well. The new threat is a respawned Ender Dragon, except it's much stronger and also much larger. It also tunnels the way dragons do in the actual game.

If you hadn't figured by Jesse being non-binary, this book will be very queer! I am planning to also make Jesskas (Jesse x Lukas) canon. Sorry, Jetra fans!

I think that's all the important information that I'll be putting in the pinned post here. So that being said, feel free to send me any questions, or ideas for this.

Thanks for reading and taking interest! I'd love to hear quite literally any ideas or concepts anyone may or may not have. Please, I don't bite!

I'm posting the rewrite to both AO3 and Wattpad in hopes of reaching a wider audience. I also know some people may have a preference for either site. Here's the AO3 link, and here is the Wattpad link.