It's Your Time To Help And Make A Difference, Will You?!

I love that Tolkien took a paragraph aside in Bree, after all the horses were run off, just to let us know that A) Merry’s ponies were going to be fine and B) Mr. Butterbur would not, in the long run, suffer financially by the incident. He understood what was really important.

Greetings, how are ya? I was wondering how you went about Aggroha's creation and what her personality is like.. She clearly enjoys fighting, but is it her great obsession or does she have room for any hobbies?

Woah, an ask! I'm doing great, thank you for asking and for paying my blog a visit! Okay, so to explain Aggroha's inception I'll need to explain a couple of things, because it's hard to talk about how I came up with creating Aggroha without also talking about Paahul. This is gonna probably be a longer read than you were expecting with these questions, but it's a fun thing to talk about! So here goes. Firstly, the setting that this game takes place in started as a personal setting I run tabletop games in. While I'm not a programmer by trade, I'm an avid tabletop GM and homebrewer, so using my pre-existing setting also as the setting for this game made sense to me, so that did a lot to limit species selection. You wouldn't be able to find any information on my setting without a lot of digging, so I've included the general species lineup for it here. I didn't want to have the player occupy any of the super tall or super short races because that would create gameplay problems and would limit opponent diversity because it'd be really hard to make a boxing game where an Eolian fights a Fonin (the unlabelled, tiny otter race on the far left of the screen) The three races I singled out for the player character ended up being Tor'cha, Chortin, and Bahaa as a result. Of the three, Chortin and Bahaa presented the most interesting possibilities for gameplay, particularly Bahaa, because in-universe every member of that species has some sort of capability to see the dead. I didn't end up going with that though! This may seem like kind of a basic thing to get stuck up on, but I had trouble deciding between two character ideas that were swirling around in my head. The first was for an aggressive Chortin fighter who fights primarily for money/the survival of their family and the second was for kinda a lovable loser of a Bahaa who fights more for fun, to make friends, and to better themself. Both of these seemed like compelling directions to take a player character in, with different strong motivations to stick around in a fighting league. In the end, I couldn't decide upon two things: The first were the sexes of the two characters, and the second was which one of them should actually be the player character. I ended up settling it with two coin flips. The result was that the Bahaa would be male and the Chortin female... And that the Chortin would be the player character and the Bahaa would be their rival. At first, I actually got a lot of anxiety about this result because I wasn't sure if people would enjoy playing a fighting game with a female main character, but as I worked more on the project and solidified the design of both characters that anxiety sort of melted away. It also helped when I realized that no matter what the result was going to be the player would spend most of the game seeing them from behind, so even if players didn't like the idea of a female fighting character they'd be seeing them from a fixed perspective where there wouldn't be much of a difference if you swapped their sex anyway. So that's where not only Aggroha, but also Paahul's general design comes from- I had two vague ideas about broad character archetypes to go with and I left it to coinflips to settle the particulars I got stuck on. Now, as for Aggroha herself: Aggroha's personality is, unsurprisingly, very direct and somewhat aggressive. She's very to-the-point, prefers simple solutions to problems, and generally she's not very patient. That being said, she isn't short-tempered, and while she isn't the smartest around, she does have a quick wit that lends her to occasionally try to make wisecracks that don't quite make sense. Socially, she's willing to lock horns with or fight others about things she's passionate with, and while she doesn't intentionally try to create drama she will absolutely get in verbal (and physical) brawls to defend things she has an interest in. As a general rule, she's confident and confrontational, although not particularly charismatic.

The funny thing though is that her relationship with fighting is more of a business relationship than anything else-- She's a single parent with at least one other mouth she has to feed. That takes up most of her time outside of the ring, so unfortunately aside from being able to whoop some serious ass she doesn't have that many marketable skills or hobbies, and she comes from a lower-class background. That's not to say she doesn't have potential- She's a quick-learner and is amazing at pattern recognition, but she just doesn't have the spare time to dedicate to other things. She takes more pride in the fact that she's good at what she does moreso than the actual occupation, if that makes sense. She does care about her legacy in the sense that she would like to take her run in the ring as far as she can push it because it would make for a good story, but actually having and keeping the champion's title isn't what drives her to fight.

Some of you may already be aware of this, but I figured I should make a proper and official announcement:

White Bear Red Rose will soon be removed from AO3 to be self-published.

I have wanted to publish a book since I was a little girl and this is the first time in my life that I ever felt so utterly gripped by a story that it feels like it might burst out of me if I don't write it down. I have never been able to get past chapter three of any novel I've tried to write in the past. Twenty-eight chapters of WBRR later - I knew I had something special on my hands.

And I knew I owed it to that little girl dreaming of being an author to get it out into the world.

I can't thank the readers who have stuck this far with WBRR enough - you guys have been such an inspiration for me to keep writing, knowing that there was even just one person out there who was interested in this "what if" story of mine. I'm truly sorry that WBRR will no longer be freely availble for you to read, but I do hope you will keep your eyes peeled for it if you're interesed in purchasing an ebook or paperback version of it in the future - I'm aiming for a summer 2025 release! I will post updates on my WordPress blog and public socials if you'd like to follow along.

That being said, I didn't want to blindsight you guys, so WBRR will remain up on AO3 until 31 October 2024, after which it will be removed. If you do download it to keep, please be mindful that the published version will be edited from its form on AO3 and of course please do not repost this story anywhere else. The AO3 version is yours to enjoy, but strictly for private use only. As for things I've posted on Tumblr, there will be some content removed from here as well, depending on how much of a "spoiler" they are.

And yes, I do intend on continuing the story with Book Two (Mary's Reign) and Book Three (Elizabeth's Reign), but, naturally, these will be directly published rather than going on AO3 first.

Thank you all again for joining me on this journey!

the spring semester starts this week and i have four (4) required books to buy and they're not cheap. so here's a reminder that i have a kofi. all the money i get from there goes towards textbooks and tuition and, like, food. thanks and love u forever

You Can Now Play the First LGBTQ Computer Game, For the First Time

‘Caper in the Castro’ was thought to be long lost.

Caper in the Castro is a legendary video game, not because legions of die-hard fans continue to play it, but because it was thought to be lost forever. Now, what is largely considered to be the first LGBTQ-focused video game (it was released in 1989) is on the Internet Archive for anybody to play.

The game is a noir point-and-click that puts the player in the (gum)shoes of a private detective named Tracker McDyke who is, in case you couldn’t guess by the name, a lesbian. McDyke must unravel the mystery behind the disappearance of Tessy LaFemme, a transgender woman, in San Francisco’s Castro district, an historically gay neighbourhood.

OOOOOHhh!

The game was released as charityware – freely, with a strong request to give a donation an AIDS Charity of their choice. I’d like to push towards still following that and donating, if you’re able.

(And you might also want to donate to the Internet Archive, who is hosting it now, while you’re at it – they’re in the middle of a donation drive, and could use your support.)

This is my favorite ever description of Tolkien.

Update on Nour and her family

I am close friends with the Al-Habil family, whose situation I have discussed under our “#ibtisam al habil” tag. There is still a lot of concern for the youngest child Nour, who is a disabled teen about whose situation you can learn more under our “#Nour Al habil” tag.

Torrential rains have flooded the streets of Gaza and all but destroyed the family’s tent. They are inundated with freezing, extremely contaminated water, which is extremely dangerous for 15 y/o Nour.

Nour is immunocompromised due to her heart condition. These flood waters carry gangrene, cholera, and polio bacteria among numerous others, as well as many viruses and pollutants.

We were about halfway through raising the funds for the tent when Nour’s mother, Ibtisam, suffered a herniated disc after sustaining an injury while moving a barrel of water. She is in severe pain, and can barely move. This is not only miserable and unhealthy for her, it also prevents her from caring for Nour.

In addition to the ongoing $2,000 USD needed for shelter, the family now needs $300 USD (about $433 CAD) to help Ibtisam manage her pain and be able to move.

New temporary goal: $52,971 CAD

Currently: $50,804 CAD

Need to raise: $2,167 CAD (about $1,500 USD)

gofundme.com

Donate to Help a family from Gaza, organized by Yaser Matar

Hello, I am Ibtisam Al-Habil. My suffering began in 2014 when my husband was martyred, and I was … Yaser Matar needs your support for Help

FAREWELL

INKtober 2024-Fight 👊💀

GOLDEN BAT vs. FRANKENSTEIN!!

The ultimate old-school monster throw-down!! The evil Dr. Nazo revives the legendary Frankenstein Monster; giving him the promise of the reanimation of his beloved bride, if in return, he serves Nazo as his minion and destroy the scientist’s sworn enemy: Golden Bat!! Can the legendary super-mummy defeat Frankenstein and save the wayward monster and his bride from becoming pawns in Dr. Nazo’s devious schemes!?…

(I know I’m not the first to have thought of this but, this is my version!)