Late Update Saturday
Sep. 23rd, 2023 11:56 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
crossover_chickAs you can see from that timestamp -- I had a VERY busy night. So busy, in fact, that I'm updating this WAY LATER than the timestamp actually says, and I need to wrap up and head to bed, so, let's just get into it --
Cleaning/Vaccination: Neither of these went as smoothly as I hoped – despite an earlier-than-normal start on the cleaning, I wasn’t even fully done with both sets of headboard shelves by the time we had to go out for our appointment; Dad’s vaccinations got a bit held up because the stupid website had put him in for the wrong dose of flu vax (he’s over 65, so he gets the bigger dose); there was a brief argument over what we were watching with lunch (subs gotten from a sandwich shop on the way home) – but both got done in the end – got my latest COVID vax, and got the cleaning done shortly after 2 PM. Glad to have that done for another couple of weeks!
Tumblr: THIS did not go as smoothly as I hoped either – mostly my own fault for spending more of the day just dicking around than I should have, but still –
Victor Luvs Alice – Didn’t get anything done on the drafts, and I only just managed to get the pictures for the Chill Valicer Save this week sorted – eighty shots, covering the “family reunion” the trio threw with their closest friends to unlock those picture frames I wanted. I guess we know what I’m working on over here for the next couple of days!
Valice Multiverse – THIS is the main reason I was so late in updating – Marie was back and active tonight, and we had two threads going (one of which was a really major fight scene between her character and Alice), and – yeah. I ended up queuing up THREE thread replies for her just now (as she had an idea for a third thread before I told her that I couldn’t add it into the mix tonight) AND a submission from one of my other partners, who plays another Van Dort child, Lily. *sigh* Yeah, uh, that was – a lot. Especially the fight thread, which just kept making me pissed off because I had to write Alice pissed off. *grumbles*
Writing: Got another page on “Londerland Bloodlines: Downtown Queensland” tonight after the OXBoxtra stuff below – Strauss has confirmed that, while Pisha slaughtering the camera crew DOES provide her with a “larder” of preserved flesh that she can feed on for hopefully an entire month, thus negating the need for more killing, she was sloppy in her methods (especially since Alice has to make sure Simon doesn’t talk – though Alice hasn’t actually mentioned that, worried Strauss will order her to kill the poor guy). Not to mention, a call to LaCroix revealed she didn’t even announce her presence in the city, meaning she’s violated Domain. LaCroix gave Alice the go-ahead to do whatever she needs to in order to resolve this as quickly as possible (as he wants her at the museum), and Alice has confirmed that this means it’s okay to kill Pisha. Hooray! :D Though, before Alice goes to do that, she does have a question about why Victor’s blood has got her feeling so happy and light – time to bring in that “resonance” feature from the V5 timeline that I really rather like and that actually fits pretty well with VTMB working on video game rules. . .
YouTube: As you can see, I skipped the video gaming today, so I had plenty of time to catch up on everything I wanted today on the old YouTubes –
A) First up, those OXBoxtra videos I wanted to watch earlier –
I. “7 Weirdly Easy Boss Fights in Very Hard Games” – Luke and Ellen over on OXtra taking us through those boss battles that feel weirdly like breather levels in the rock-hard games they live in! From Pinwheel in the original Dark Souls (a slow-moving boss at the bottom of the catacombs who TRIES to trick you with clones but isn’t very good at it), to Werner Werman in Cuphead (a very straightforward rat-driving-a-soup-can-tank boss with easy-to-learn patterns in a game that’s generally about throwing everything at you all of the time and forcing you to dodge it with perfect precision), to the Celestial Emissary in Bloodborne (a big jelly alien with not a lot of health in a big garden full of little jelly aliens, this thing is generally easily taken down but CAN kill you if you’re not watching the stomp or the alien breath – as poor Luke can attest to), these bosses feel like they wandered in from another game and were given a fight out of pity. Which many players are thankful for, because fuck yes, a moment where you don’t feel like you’re about to snap your controller in half. XD
II. “7 Bad Endings That Were Harder Work Than the Good Ending” – Jane, Mike, and Andy taking us through those games where, weirdly, a bad ending was harder to achieve than a good one! Put in the effort to “secure your throne” in Mafia III by having protagonist Lincoln kill off all his trusted lieutenants in what I presume to be reasonably difficult boss battles? Surprise, your spiritual adviser Father James sticks a car bomb in your vehicle! Should have fled town while you had the chance. . . Think putting in the effort to get at least seven of the eight secret stars in Braid might unlock an ending where you’re NOT revealed as an asshole boyfriend the princess is running from? Nope, that just gets you the ending where she EXPLODES and suddenly all those theories about her being in fact the atom bomb feel a lot more valid. Should have gotten off that super-slow-moving cloud while you had the chance. . . And want to be the kingpin of Mr. X’s syndicate in a multiplayer game of Streets of Rage (you don’t get the option in single player) so badly that you don’t only beat Mr. X to death, but also the character of the friend that you were playing it? . . .well, you will achieve that goal and the game will tell you that you’re great before insisting this is the Bad End. Andy noted the dissonance. XD
B) Then, after supper and my shower, it was time for some Corpse Bride clips to celebrate it being the release date! Specifically, two roughly ten-minute chunks uploaded by Warner Bros themselves to encourage people to get the movie digitally – one covering from the ill-fated rehearsal to Bonejangles getting ready to launch into “Remains of the Day,” and the other from Emily taking Victor to Gutknecht’s tower to her yanking him out of Victoria’s room and him blurting out that he would never marry her. Given how short the actual movie is, this was a pretty decent chunk of it to watch today – and it’s always nice to refresh my memory on what canon!Victor is like, given my fanfic versions tend to go in some weird directions sometimes. XD
C) And then, with ice cream, it was time to hit the Subs for GrayStillPlays and “Testing cars vs roll overs in GTA 5!” Another Alex torture board, this one with the goal of getting Gray to flip his car at inconvenient moments while doing the various challenges! Gray had to find the right car to make it past the Ramp Buggy Rollover Test (a timed tightrope challenge where Gray had to drive a car over a narrow platform and all the various ramp buggies lining the sides without flipping over and falling off – and if he didn’t do it in the time limit, a bunch of windmills came up from the earth to smack him around), the Moose Rollover Test (but I don’t have moose, I have deer) (an obstacle course where Gray had to swerve around a bunch of inconveniently placed deer and stop sticks without rolling his car – and again, the course was timed, meaning if he didn’t complete it within the limit, the hunter at the very end of the line would kill him in two shots), the Flip Resistance Rollover Test (a series of jumps with flipping ramps at the end of each platform – Gray had to make the jump, then recover from being nearly flipped over and go on to the next one – the platforms got smaller and the ramps got higher with every jump; and AGAIN, it was timed – Gray took too long, the platforms would just straight-up disappear underneath him) the Hytraulics Rollover Test (possibly typo Alex’s, possibly a pun – this one required Gray to use the hydraulics Alex had added to the car to rock it from side to side and lift the tires up so he could squeeze through a series of gaps lined with rolling razor blades designed to pop your tires, so he could make it over a final ramp at the end), and finally, after a checkpoint, the 300 MPH Rollover Machine (basically a giant-forklift-style thing would take Gray’s car and YEET it toward the end of a cliff – Gray’s job was to stop his car before it rolled or skidded off the edge so he could drive to the ramp off to the side and make the win). A lot of cars couldn’t even make it past the first challenge (certainly none of the super-cars, one of which just got straight-up yeeted a whole neighborhood away)! For those that did – the Liberator monster truck actually made it to the deer but couldn’t get the speed necessary to complete the course; the side-by-side made it to the ramp jumps before starting to get a little too flippy (same with the Canis Lifeguard mobile); and my beloved Wastelander did AMAZINGLY well up until the “hytraulics” gaps, where it just couldn’t get through without getting tires popped. The winner this time was the space-marine-themed car, which had enough speed and agility to make it through the timed courses, enough height on the hydraulics to get over the razor blades, and – well, sometimes it didn’t roll over when yeeted at the end, allowing Gray to finally get it under control and get it to the win. XD Ooof, that was a painful one, Alex! You’re mean. :p
Other: Reread a OT3 Corpse Bride fic I saw earlier on AO3 called “New Arrivals” and THIS time remembered to leave a damn comment. XD Good way to celebrate the CB release date, and we gotta encourage the OT3 Victor/Victoria/Emily shippers!
So yeah -- I guess I accomplished most of what I set out to do, but I could have done with less distraction, both from myself and from others. *sigh* And now it's time to go to bed -- tomorrow, it'll be time to start drafting up the Chill Valicer Save update for the week on Victor Luvs Alice; playing some Fallout 4 and doing some more Silver Shroud stuff back in Goodneighbor; updating the FO4 playthrough progression appropriately; getting in a workout; and keeping up with GrayStillPlays and Jon. That SHOULD be doable, I think -- especially with a little extra time in the evening from my extra day off. *nods* Night all!
Cleaning/Vaccination: Neither of these went as smoothly as I hoped – despite an earlier-than-normal start on the cleaning, I wasn’t even fully done with both sets of headboard shelves by the time we had to go out for our appointment; Dad’s vaccinations got a bit held up because the stupid website had put him in for the wrong dose of flu vax (he’s over 65, so he gets the bigger dose); there was a brief argument over what we were watching with lunch (subs gotten from a sandwich shop on the way home) – but both got done in the end – got my latest COVID vax, and got the cleaning done shortly after 2 PM. Glad to have that done for another couple of weeks!
Tumblr: THIS did not go as smoothly as I hoped either – mostly my own fault for spending more of the day just dicking around than I should have, but still –
Victor Luvs Alice – Didn’t get anything done on the drafts, and I only just managed to get the pictures for the Chill Valicer Save this week sorted – eighty shots, covering the “family reunion” the trio threw with their closest friends to unlock those picture frames I wanted. I guess we know what I’m working on over here for the next couple of days!
Valice Multiverse – THIS is the main reason I was so late in updating – Marie was back and active tonight, and we had two threads going (one of which was a really major fight scene between her character and Alice), and – yeah. I ended up queuing up THREE thread replies for her just now (as she had an idea for a third thread before I told her that I couldn’t add it into the mix tonight) AND a submission from one of my other partners, who plays another Van Dort child, Lily. *sigh* Yeah, uh, that was – a lot. Especially the fight thread, which just kept making me pissed off because I had to write Alice pissed off. *grumbles*
Writing: Got another page on “Londerland Bloodlines: Downtown Queensland” tonight after the OXBoxtra stuff below – Strauss has confirmed that, while Pisha slaughtering the camera crew DOES provide her with a “larder” of preserved flesh that she can feed on for hopefully an entire month, thus negating the need for more killing, she was sloppy in her methods (especially since Alice has to make sure Simon doesn’t talk – though Alice hasn’t actually mentioned that, worried Strauss will order her to kill the poor guy). Not to mention, a call to LaCroix revealed she didn’t even announce her presence in the city, meaning she’s violated Domain. LaCroix gave Alice the go-ahead to do whatever she needs to in order to resolve this as quickly as possible (as he wants her at the museum), and Alice has confirmed that this means it’s okay to kill Pisha. Hooray! :D Though, before Alice goes to do that, she does have a question about why Victor’s blood has got her feeling so happy and light – time to bring in that “resonance” feature from the V5 timeline that I really rather like and that actually fits pretty well with VTMB working on video game rules. . .
YouTube: As you can see, I skipped the video gaming today, so I had plenty of time to catch up on everything I wanted today on the old YouTubes –
A) First up, those OXBoxtra videos I wanted to watch earlier –
I. “7 Weirdly Easy Boss Fights in Very Hard Games” – Luke and Ellen over on OXtra taking us through those boss battles that feel weirdly like breather levels in the rock-hard games they live in! From Pinwheel in the original Dark Souls (a slow-moving boss at the bottom of the catacombs who TRIES to trick you with clones but isn’t very good at it), to Werner Werman in Cuphead (a very straightforward rat-driving-a-soup-can-tank boss with easy-to-learn patterns in a game that’s generally about throwing everything at you all of the time and forcing you to dodge it with perfect precision), to the Celestial Emissary in Bloodborne (a big jelly alien with not a lot of health in a big garden full of little jelly aliens, this thing is generally easily taken down but CAN kill you if you’re not watching the stomp or the alien breath – as poor Luke can attest to), these bosses feel like they wandered in from another game and were given a fight out of pity. Which many players are thankful for, because fuck yes, a moment where you don’t feel like you’re about to snap your controller in half. XD
II. “7 Bad Endings That Were Harder Work Than the Good Ending” – Jane, Mike, and Andy taking us through those games where, weirdly, a bad ending was harder to achieve than a good one! Put in the effort to “secure your throne” in Mafia III by having protagonist Lincoln kill off all his trusted lieutenants in what I presume to be reasonably difficult boss battles? Surprise, your spiritual adviser Father James sticks a car bomb in your vehicle! Should have fled town while you had the chance. . . Think putting in the effort to get at least seven of the eight secret stars in Braid might unlock an ending where you’re NOT revealed as an asshole boyfriend the princess is running from? Nope, that just gets you the ending where she EXPLODES and suddenly all those theories about her being in fact the atom bomb feel a lot more valid. Should have gotten off that super-slow-moving cloud while you had the chance. . . And want to be the kingpin of Mr. X’s syndicate in a multiplayer game of Streets of Rage (you don’t get the option in single player) so badly that you don’t only beat Mr. X to death, but also the character of the friend that you were playing it? . . .well, you will achieve that goal and the game will tell you that you’re great before insisting this is the Bad End. Andy noted the dissonance. XD
B) Then, after supper and my shower, it was time for some Corpse Bride clips to celebrate it being the release date! Specifically, two roughly ten-minute chunks uploaded by Warner Bros themselves to encourage people to get the movie digitally – one covering from the ill-fated rehearsal to Bonejangles getting ready to launch into “Remains of the Day,” and the other from Emily taking Victor to Gutknecht’s tower to her yanking him out of Victoria’s room and him blurting out that he would never marry her. Given how short the actual movie is, this was a pretty decent chunk of it to watch today – and it’s always nice to refresh my memory on what canon!Victor is like, given my fanfic versions tend to go in some weird directions sometimes. XD
C) And then, with ice cream, it was time to hit the Subs for GrayStillPlays and “Testing cars vs roll overs in GTA 5!” Another Alex torture board, this one with the goal of getting Gray to flip his car at inconvenient moments while doing the various challenges! Gray had to find the right car to make it past the Ramp Buggy Rollover Test (a timed tightrope challenge where Gray had to drive a car over a narrow platform and all the various ramp buggies lining the sides without flipping over and falling off – and if he didn’t do it in the time limit, a bunch of windmills came up from the earth to smack him around), the Moose Rollover Test (but I don’t have moose, I have deer) (an obstacle course where Gray had to swerve around a bunch of inconveniently placed deer and stop sticks without rolling his car – and again, the course was timed, meaning if he didn’t complete it within the limit, the hunter at the very end of the line would kill him in two shots), the Flip Resistance Rollover Test (a series of jumps with flipping ramps at the end of each platform – Gray had to make the jump, then recover from being nearly flipped over and go on to the next one – the platforms got smaller and the ramps got higher with every jump; and AGAIN, it was timed – Gray took too long, the platforms would just straight-up disappear underneath him) the Hytraulics Rollover Test (possibly typo Alex’s, possibly a pun – this one required Gray to use the hydraulics Alex had added to the car to rock it from side to side and lift the tires up so he could squeeze through a series of gaps lined with rolling razor blades designed to pop your tires, so he could make it over a final ramp at the end), and finally, after a checkpoint, the 300 MPH Rollover Machine (basically a giant-forklift-style thing would take Gray’s car and YEET it toward the end of a cliff – Gray’s job was to stop his car before it rolled or skidded off the edge so he could drive to the ramp off to the side and make the win). A lot of cars couldn’t even make it past the first challenge (certainly none of the super-cars, one of which just got straight-up yeeted a whole neighborhood away)! For those that did – the Liberator monster truck actually made it to the deer but couldn’t get the speed necessary to complete the course; the side-by-side made it to the ramp jumps before starting to get a little too flippy (same with the Canis Lifeguard mobile); and my beloved Wastelander did AMAZINGLY well up until the “hytraulics” gaps, where it just couldn’t get through without getting tires popped. The winner this time was the space-marine-themed car, which had enough speed and agility to make it through the timed courses, enough height on the hydraulics to get over the razor blades, and – well, sometimes it didn’t roll over when yeeted at the end, allowing Gray to finally get it under control and get it to the win. XD Ooof, that was a painful one, Alex! You’re mean. :p
Other: Reread a OT3 Corpse Bride fic I saw earlier on AO3 called “New Arrivals” and THIS time remembered to leave a damn comment. XD Good way to celebrate the CB release date, and we gotta encourage the OT3 Victor/Victoria/Emily shippers!
So yeah -- I guess I accomplished most of what I set out to do, but I could have done with less distraction, both from myself and from others. *sigh* And now it's time to go to bed -- tomorrow, it'll be time to start drafting up the Chill Valicer Save update for the week on Victor Luvs Alice; playing some Fallout 4 and doing some more Silver Shroud stuff back in Goodneighbor; updating the FO4 playthrough progression appropriately; getting in a workout; and keeping up with GrayStillPlays and Jon. That SHOULD be doable, I think -- especially with a little extra time in the evening from my extra day off. *nods* Night all!
