I love cool fantasy stuff.
So I can’t help staring longingly at cool costume mystery boxes.
https://foxesandravens.com/products/market-of-mystery-box?variant=42917450088647
Holiday Shopping
Since the Holidays are coming up, I want to remind people that I have stuff to sell!!
First is the shop created by my dad, who then handed it over to me. https://www.zazzle.com/store/tkepner/products
My own horde of products that I’ve made over on Zazzle. https://www.zazzle.com/store/qrkepners_merch/products
And my Redbubble shop! Which has fun stickers and such! http://RoseBloodCat.redbubble.com
I’m playing DnD again
And I feel like sharing the lastest game I’ve played. It’s very short.
Primitive Technology
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAL3JXZSzSm8AlZyD3nQdBA
For anyone trying to write a story about someone having to work with primitive tools or struggling to survive in the wilderness; here’s a cool channel about the use and creation of tools and shelters that you may need!
It’s cool! And a good reminder that being clever is one of the greatest tools that mankind had. Even in the far past.
Otome Games are not My Scene, but I Love the Idea of Mocking Them
I’m considering writing a story (a novel, specifically) that’s a satire about Otome/Dating games. Inspired by a book I’ve been reading that’s been pointing out flaws in stuff that happens in those games. (It’s called “Accomplishments of the Duke’s Daughter”. It’s a good novel.)
A Girl wakes up in the world of a Fantasy Otome game that she HATES. But she’s a (male!) side character and therefore free of the game’s main “plot”. (The glimpses of the world it was set in sounded amazing, and she hadn’t been allowed to see ANY OF IT.)
She loves adventure games more than anything else but had originally been tricked by a friend into playing the game. (She’s got very little interest in romance. At all.) She had been told that it was a cool fantasy adventure game, with guilds and dungeons and monsters.
The anger she felt when she played and discovered that she never actually got to tackle any of those challenges was REAL.
She played through every story, but not because she’d grown to like it. She played them all out of SPITE so she could thoroughly nitpick and lambast it as revenge against the friend who was making her play it. And now she’s in the game, itself.
So she’s decided that she’s gonna do all the cool, fun things she was never able to do before.
And, since she’s a guy now (and a pretty broke one at that), there is NO PRESSURE on her to do the stuff she has no interest in. No one is telling her to do more “feminine” work. Or treating her like she’s too frail for adventure. Or trying to make her find romance to be a “proper” woman.
No, she’s a guy and allowed to be messy and pick up weapons and travel around at night by herself.
And she is there for it.
Honestly, finding all kinds of stuff to dismantle and make fun of for these games is fun. If anyone else has thoughts on stuff they love/hate/know are not how things would actually work in an Otome game, send them my way!!
Ganon-Centric Story Idea
I have no idea whether this would be a game idea or a fanfic that someone could write someday, but I think the idea of some kind of Redemption story for Ganondorf could be really interesting to tackle.
I have had this idea in my brain for years, ever since I read a fic on FF dot net called “Cry for Hyrule”. I thought it was a really cool story, and did a good job of making Ganondorf a more nuanced character without handwaving the bad things he’d done in the past. Or trying to reframe the goddesses/spirits as evil, hateful beings who don’t actually care about the people they’re supposed to be helping/protecting.
(It also tackled some logic problems in the game it was mostly focused on, like Link being thrown in over his head so often. Or the trees the Koroks were planting to lower the waters always dying despite raising Hyrule being one of Ganondorf’s goals. This was a Wind Waker fic, btw)
I’ve always believed that people aren’t born evil, not even as the result of a curse. Which makes thinking about Ganondorf’s original motives and fall from grace really interesting for me.
He could have, at one time, had very good intentions and reasons for his actions. But then Demise’s Curse over Hyrule took those intentions and twisted them until they became unrecognisable.
Reincarnation exists in the Zelda-verse, even if it’s more of a Vishnu style incarnation/avatar situation rather than a full rebirth.
A reincarnation story built around Ganondorf himself could be really cool. And him working to redeem himself of his past actions could be a deeply moving game/story. With him trying to prove/separate himself from the actions of his past life and prove himself as a skilled/capable King of the Gerudo.
Or maybe the evil was scrubbed off from his soul enough to return him (at least partially) to the person he’d been before the curse Twisted him, and looking back at his past actions horrifies/disgists him. I mean, he’s constantly being wallopped with sacred and/or blessed weapons. The idea that, at some point, those could scrape off the evil to bring back the person he used to be seems possible. Or it being done intentionally as some kind of “weaken the bad guy by turning him back to before he got the evil power boost” type of plan.
And this change is enough that the Tri-force goddesses (or maybe even the mystery goddess the Gerudo worshipped back in OoT) are willing to give him a chance. A chance to prove himself. The chance to clean the rest of the evil away. The chance to prove he really is worthy of their blessing.
I think it would be a really cool story to read/play through. And it could be a great chance to expand Ganondorf’s personality and to explore more of the Gerudo’s culture.
I have to admit, the chance to play as Ganondorf in a jrpg type of game would be fascinating. (Maybe one of those ones with a settlement/kingdom builder thing too… For him trying to prove he really is a good leader/kind.)
Or one of those branching storyline games, the sort with more than one ending that you get to by making different desicions in game. Good, Neutral, and Bad endings based on choices you make.
God, the more I talk about this, the more I want it…
(For fanfic, the idea of a story or a crossover where Ganondorf is trying to redeem himself by building a new settlement somewhere or trying to help a hero as part of his redemption could be really good.)
(I don’t know why my brain keeps chucking Naruto at me, but him accidentally kidnapping a little Naruto because of how much he looks like the brat who finally stopped/killed him and then raising/training him could be fun. Maybe the goal Ganon thinks he’s supposed to be fulfilling is finding a place to build a new Kingdom to make up for the one he annilated/raised to the ground, but no. It’s raising this Prophecy child to do better than he would if left to his own devices.)
(Okay, I am done rambling about all this now. Please, someone either make/write this, or help me figure out enough to at least start writing it.)
Matwilo of the Unovan Gerudo
Did some design planning to figure out how Matwilo looks. I mean, I obviously have the design I made in PLA (since I used him as my player character), but I needed to figure out how he would look as I drew/described him in the story. I’ll post colored versions of these drawings later.
Like making it clear that, as a Gerudo, he is a stronk boi. He gets to be a lil’ biff, as a treat.
Also, he thinks Hisui (Sinnoh) is way too cold and is always dressed in multiple layers. He’s a desert child, snow is not his element.
PLA and LoZ: Matwilo
Just because I feel like talking about OCs today, I’ve decided to bust out the one I came up with (and dug very deep into) while first playing Pokemon Legends Arceus. Since I, like every Nintendo player at the time, made the connection of it being like BotW. Because of that, I made him based around the idea of writing a crossover (kinda) with him.
His name is Matwilo and he’s a Gerudo. But despite being the sole male born in his generation, he is NOT the King. And the tribe he was born to live in the Unova Desert. (This will make sense in a second I promise.)
The Gerudo in Unova are survivors of the Great Flood. (aka the Adult timeline for Legend of Zelda. The same timeline as Winwaker, Phantom Hourglass, and Spirit Tracks.)
They managed to escape drowning thanks to the prophetic warning given by the goddesses, though they were separated from a large number of their fellow tribeswomen. (At least, many hoped they had all just been separated and not, well, I’m sure you can guess the alternative.) The flash floods and torrential rains frightened them all but they’d managed to survive them.
However, they quickly realized that there was something wrong with the seas. Eventually, some of the braver women took a chance and dove below the surface of the waters. And, in doing so, they figured out what the problem was.
There were no plants beneath the waves, the land was completely barren. Just like the mesa’s they’d climbed to escape the rising waters.
If there were no plants, then there was nothing for sea animals to eat. Sea animals wouldn’t go to any place where there was no food. And if there were no animals, there would be nothing for their tribe to eat either. And the mesa top’s soil quality was too low to grow food on. And even if they could, there wasn’t enough room for their tribe to live off of for very long.
Simply put, they couldn’t stay there if they wanted to survive. And the same went for the other races of Hyrule.
But the Gerudo were already somewhat nomadic (despite the presence of their Fortress/Tower), so they were unfazed by the idea of packing up and leaving everything behind. Something that wasn’t true for the other races, who were all very anchored to their homes and wouldn’t leave them easily.
So they built a ship from the little wood/supplies they had and could get their hands on and went looking for a place to settle down and build a new life and lifestyle for their daughters.
(Yes, they do the pirate thing for a bit. They collect treasure, improve their ship, and get better supplies. Not to mention build a new well of tricks and skills for their culture to thrive on.)
During a serious storm, one that could have potentially sunk them, they (unknowingly) traveled through a portal that brought them to the coast of Unova, right on the edge of the desert.
Seeing a place that was so much like their lost home, but now with the good things from their sea travels and the best things about being by the sea as well, they settled there right away and quickly established a new home for themselves. (Full set up! Fishing, smithing, farming, anything and everything to make a stable life for them all.)
They later connected with the Kingdoms to the north and built trade routes (and neutrality should their wars ever start up again. (Or if they were happening at the time?)) Also to help ensure future Gerudo tribe members. They kind of intimidated the Kingdoms when they first met, since they were trained warriors and were practically armed to the teeth, but the fear/worry is eased by the openness/friendliness the Gerudo presented.
(Being hostile/isolated was one of the things that hurt them so badly in the Flood and with Hyrule in general, so they were trying to shed that by opening themselves up to outsiders more.)
Fast forward to the Modern Era of Unova, where the Gerodo have become widespread and no one thinks twice about them.
(They also still maintain their traditions, including intense survival and combat training from a young age and teaching all their children how to pick locks and get out of traps/bindings without issue.)
Matwilo was the first son born to the tribes in centuries, but they no-one had a need/place for a King anymore. (They used a Cheif-system now, one that was earned by the potential Cheif’s own merits and not by a birthright.) So he was raised as just another member of the tribes, aside from some special training he’s given based on the few remaining knowledge of things a male Gerudo needed to know/be able to do. (Mostly magic and combat stuff their ancestors managed to write down before they could be forgotten.)
Matwilo lives at home on a smallish Equine Pokemon Ranch with his mother (who has very poor health) and a few of his Aunts and cousins. He never went on his “official” Pokemon journey, choosing to forgo it to help his family around the ranch instead. The only Pokemon he has are a Mudbray gifted to him by a cousin and a Yamask he caught in the sands.
And he’s perfectly happy with all of that.
Until, one rainy night, he wakes to (what he’s sure is) the sound of a strange voice calling his name.
He grabs his hunting knife from its spot on his bedside table, lets out his yamask, and creeps out to investigate.
If asked, he’ll never be able to say what happened next, just that the next thing he could remember was waking up on a strange beach with a professor he’d never seen or heard of before asking him if he was alive and a trio of Pokemon hovering nearby.
‘This can’t be right,’ Matwilo thought to himself. ‘Hyrulians are the ones who’re supposed to get kidnapped for Godly missions. Not Gerudo!‘
Anyway, that’s the base of the idea! Please comment or ask if you want to know more! (Please send me asks and comments about this. I have spent WAY too much time world building about this so I could write it before I was consumed by Sningo stuff. Give me the chance to babble about it!! Like how I got Matwilo’s name!)
Sycamore Goes Ballistic AKA Something I Would Love to See
I need to vent a pokemon-themed idea I was hit with while working my shift yesterday. (Minor warning for swears I dropped in here. They are purely for emphasis.)
What if, instead of being mellow or keeping the usually “Calm collected Professor” schtick, Professor Sycamore had instead lost his shit and lit into Lysandre for the asinine, selfish, and genocidal plan to “fix” Kalos?
We never see any of the professor characters really lose their cool in the series. They’re always beacons of calm or logic in the face of horrible things. The closest we see to them losing their cool is when they’re helping stop a world-ending disaster from happening. But even then, it’s more “We need to hurry and stop this” instead of them getting angry or panicked.
So my first thought was, of all the Professors, who would actually be the most likely to blow their top at their region’s villains?
Firstly, they would have to have some kind of personal connection to the bad guy in question, which knocked the majority of the professors out of the running. Oak, Elm, Birch, Rowan, and Juniper. None of whom had a personal connection to their region’s Villains. Kikui and Magnolia are also out, but their reason is more complicated.
(Guzma isn’t really a villain, though he is an antagonist. While Magnolia seems pretty disconnected from Rose, though they probably know each other through their jobs.)
Then it hit me.
Professor Sycamore is the one professor with a deep, personal connection to the major Big Bad of his region. They were old friends (more than that, in the opinion of many fans), so Lysandre’s plan to nuke the region would have hit way harder and hurt a lot more. And I could absolutely see Sycamore feeling hurt and angry enough to have a go at him.
While hauling stuff inside so we could close, I was struck by the mental image of a viciously (and righteously) furious Sycamore chewing Lysandre up one side and down the other. And, of course, once I had that image, I had to figure out how/why/what had pushed Sycamore over the edge to make him finally lose it.
I mean, the GIANT DEATH WEAPON is obviously a pretty good motive for going ballistic, especially from the angle of the two being Exes.
Now, I like the idea of Lysandre managing to survive but possibly being in a coma that no one is sure when he’ll wake up from (If he wakes up), as that gives plenty of time for Sycamore to be quietly stewing in how to effectively chew him out once he finally does. (And has recovered enough for Sycamore to visit him.) This tongue-lashing is one that’s getting the chance to simmer before it’s unleashed.
(I know a lot of people go for the “I miss how we used to be” angle, but I feel like that almost downplays the horrors of what Lysandre was planning. That was a region-wide genocide that he was planning and, if the damage done by the Weapon while it was “weakened” was anything to go by, I don’t think even Team Flare could have survived the fallout from it. Constantly having them wax poetic about their former relationship feels like it glosses over the whole “Destroying the World” thing that happened.)
(But I feel like Sycamore deserves the chance to be pissed at his ex enough to force said ex to actually soul-search and try to be a better person before he can revitalize their romance.)
BUT, there is also the story stuff from US/UM and the Pokemon Masters game, where they have all kinds of interdimensional shit going down. Including alternate versions of villains getting thrown into other worlds at the moment of them activating their plans/just after kicking things into motion.
And, wonderfully enough, a possibility for Sycamore to have a run-in with a whole and healthy version of Lysandre who had been just getting ready to unleash his death ray on the world before getting unceremoniously dropped into another universe.
AKA a perfect target for Sycamore to go ape-shit on without a scrap of guilt, audience be damned.
And it would be a full tirade! With all kinds of ugly facts, well-thought-out alternatives that his old “friend” could have used to better the world if he’d been willing to tighten his belt, calling the genocide the “coward’s way out” because he decided to give up instead of putting in the work, and a heaping helping of words and french that the clean and friendly professor would normally never use (much less in public) on Lysandre.
Sycamore going ape-shit on him would probably have a very profound effect on Lysandre because I doubt anyone had laid out the flaws (in both his plan and his character) like that. And it’s coming from someone he personally knows. Not just a random cop or a ballsy kid.
And he can tell this isn’t just a bought of random rage. It’s much too well thought out (despite the crude, viscous language thrown in) and deeply personal to be something like that. It’s a boil-over built from stress/anger/fear that his mere presence set off.
And having the fallout that happened thrown in also humanizes the consequences of his plan in a way he probably never thought about before. It’s one thing to talk about faceless masses, it’s something very different to put a face and name to them. (Even if one of those faces was his own.)
Mostly, I just really want someone to finally blow their top and call Pokemon Villains with genocide and/or “world-changing” plans to be called out on their bullshit.
(I also have an OC that I thought of tweaking a bit to add more fuel to the fire, but I can ramble about my XY baby on a later date. Assuming anyone wants to know about them.)
Psychic Sherlock
Was struck by the sudden idea of Holmes being a psychic as an explanation for how he can make such crazy jumps in logic while investigating while still managing to be right.
My first thoughts for the specific powerset would be Psychometry (the ability to glean the past or future or the people connected to an object through touch) or Retro-Cognition (the ability to look into the past and clearly see past events).
I mean… It would make a lot more sense for the versions where the writers hide everything from the audience to “prove” how Crazy Smart Holmes is supposed to be.