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Rules Redux

4 min read

After having to ban a couple people over attempts to spread (debunked) propaganda and harassing another watcher in the comments, I want to go over the rules for my page again since apparently it's too difficult for some people to be decent human beings:


High Offenses: Instant Banhammer

-Please do not spread Misinformation;

--while freedom of speech exists, I do not pander to conspiracy theorists on real world issues (especially related to vaccines due to the fact that some people still believe it can cause autism); my page is not the place to blame vampires for global warming...or whatever crazy, debunked, false narratives folks get into down the rabbit hole.

The only tinfoil hat theories allowed here are silly ones relating to games/anime/other fictional work.


-Please do not Harass/threaten my other watchers (or me);

--there's no need to be a bully or a jerk; please be kind and respectful even if you disagree with someone. Debate is fine, but being toxic is not.


If you are being bullied or harassed in the comment section of one of my drawings/updates, please let me know via a Note (with a link to the thread or drawing/post) so I can deal with it. Sadly, I am unable to see some of it unless the person is directly responding to me. Also, block the person.

If you are being threatened, do the same steps above and also report the person to DA (or your local law enforcement if it's an actual threat of harm to your person and you feel like you are in danger).


-Please do not steal my art;

--self explanatory on this one. If I find you've reposted my artwork without permission anywhere, that's an instant ban...as well as a report to DA (and possibly a copyright lawsuit).

That also includes Patreon-exclusive drawings...and I'd really rather not have to ban anyone over stuff like that, so please just don't do it.


-Please do not spam or try to scam;

--whether via my front page, drawings, Notes, ect. This behavior will result in a ban and a report to DA.



Mid Offensive: (can result in a ban depending on severity)

-Please be Kind, not toxic;

--everyone has their off days, and you might not agree with what I'm saying or what someone else is saying. Understandable. But if you feel strongly enough about it to comment, the internet allows you to pause and think/review what you've written before you hit "submit".

I ask that you kindly use that.


-Please respect religion choices;

--I do enjoy learning about other cultures and religions, and I don't mind if people mention theirs or talk about theirs. However, trying to convert someone is not okay.


-Please do not post links;

--at least, ones which don't link to something else on DA.

I never click on any link posted for an external site, and typically will hide the comment (even if it's an innocent one). If you want to show me a video, you're welcome to Note me or message me the link, but I have to worry not only about my own computer's virus protection but of other watchers' computers...

...as well as the ages of potential viewers. Since my artwork is "cute" I have many watchers who are minors, and I don't want them seeing something NSFW due to a link on my page.


--

Basically, just try and be kind and respectful, or agree to disagree.


I'm not saying you have to agree with everything I post (or what someone is saying in a comment...particularly as I'm leaning into some satire work with my latest comic which is going to have touchy subjects), but this is not a forum/reddit/youtube/facebook/twitter/ect...

...I do not tolerate toxicity, spam, trolls, or cyber bullying.


TL;DR: I do not tolerate the intolerant, and I want to keep my page (and community) clean.


Thank you!

-Kairy

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So, going to start off with a couple important warnings/disclaimers/notices.


DISCLAIMER 1: If you enjoy Palworld, I am not judging you or saying you can't like it. I have friends who enjoy it, and we're still friends. Just because I have a different opinion of something you like, that does not mean I'm insulting you.


DISCLAIMER 2: I do not, in any way, simp for Nintendo/Game Freak/The Pokemon Company. I'm rather critical of all three, including their games and how their company works. Pokemon has a long way to go, and I'm certainly not going to make any excuses for one of the highest grossing franchises, let alone for a AAA game studio.


So...we're cool now, yea? We've gotten out of the way that me disliking something you like is not an insult to you or to make you feel bad or guilty for playing/enjoying it, and that I'm just as, if not more, critical of AAA game companies.


I don't mind engaging in debates or hearing differing opinions, but let's keep things civil.

I say all this because it's sadly necessary these days, and there are far more people who seem to love and defend Palworld than there are critics of it (and the people who are critical of it are sneered at and-or attacked by Palworld fans).


Let's start.


I certainly do not keep my disdain for Palworld a secret. And while the AI controversy surrounding the game has no proof to back it up, and I'm aware of that, I'm still on the side of "yea, that's totally still possible" considering how much AI is ruining pretty much every creative industry (not to mention what it's doing to Gen Alpha's reading/writing comprehension, but that's another can of worms).


I'm aware that the entire "they used AI" is unproven and originated from a tweet (and Twitter/X is about as good a source of information as TikTok is; aka, it's not), but the argument against it is the devs saying "we didn't use AI".


There are how many thousands of people on DA who don't mark their obvious AI artwork as AI?

And with how much disdain I have for AI, please excuse me for not believing these devs...if you can even call them devs (I'll come back to that in a moment).


--


Issue #1 with Palworld: The "art"


I'm a solo indie dev working on a game. At one point, I was going to have it be a 3D game and thus started to learn Blender. I've learned enough Unity to put together simple games, which means I'm also familiar with how assets work and are shared.

What does this mean/why did I mention this?

So that folks can understand that I'm coming from a place of having experience with art, 3D image modeling, and game development.


So when I say something like "critics are correct in that it's very difficult to completely recreate such a similar looking model", I mean it.

I started to make my characters in Blender, and started with a tutorial (only instead of using their example, I used one of my own drawings as the model). I'd use the same techniques to work with the mesh, but it looks way different from the tutorial I was following.


That's a combination of "there are little tweaks here and there which can change something" and that I was using an original character instead of theirs.


Which means I'm more likely to believe that the Palworld devs took assets (models) of pokemon and modified them (or used an AI program on them) to make amalgamations and change them just enough so that they can't be sued.

There were even two designs which did not make it into the game because they were too close to actual pokemon (the more commonly known Luxray clone, and one which looks like a reshade of a mega-Mewtwo).


It's extremely suspicious just how close to the pokemon designs the Pals are.


(I've had to look up the names of the Pals here)


If you do the "squint test", there are many Pals which look like a combination of pokemon (and some apparently from other places such as YoKai Watch).


There are some which just look like they've been tweaked a bit in their 3D render.


Jolthog. If you take off Shaymin's bushy top and give it yellow spikes, and tweak its expression, this is what you get. Arguments I've heard are typically "but it's literally just a hedgehog!"...

Yea? Sonic is a hedgehog, and due to design from the artists and their style, you can still sort of tell it's a hedgehog but there are enough creative liberties to distinguish them.


Cremis = Eevee, and everyone knows it (particularly dynamax/gigantamax Eevee). The only way to look at this thing and not see Eevee is if you've never played pokemon and-or somehow forgot what Eevee looks like.


Possibly the biggest offender is Verdash, which looks like a grass-type Cinderace. The body structure is identical to Cinderace; look at the way the mesh narrows at the knees and goes into those long feet, which also look identical to Cinderace (and yes, it's possible to make even a rabbit's foot look different), as well as the thin arms which end in those nub-like hands.

The chances of making something like that in a 3D modeling program without copying the proportions from an existing 3D model are slim to none.


Now let's talk about the amalgamations.


Let's take Lifmunk for example. The second I looked at it, my first thought was "grass-type Pachirisu combined with Leafeon". Even the tail movement in its dex(?) entry looks the same as Pachirisu's tail movement. This isn't one of the bigger offenders, as enough seems to have been modified, so let's move on.


A great example of an amalgamation is Dumud. It's got Sharpedo's body, Sobble's fin, and Slowpoke's eyes.


Another is Dinossum. It's got the head/top of the head flower of Lilligant, the body and tail of Goodra, and the face and eyes of Meganium.


For rendering/texture, this could have set some of them aside...but somehow, the textures help bring together that "pokemon" look.


Tocotoco, for example. The patterns on it, and colors, is exactly the same as Xatu. If they had rendered it differently, then there probably wouldn't be an issue. But whatever assets they were using to render these creatures give them very pokemon-like patterns and eyes (which is one of the most obvious uses).


It's evil genius, really. The eyes and patterns of these poke...I mean, Pals, look so similar to Pokemon (as well as their designs) that it tickles that "nostalgia" factor for people.


My biggest issue with this entire debacle over the art is that I have not been able to find any concept artwork. Concept art is a big, and important, step in the process of creating 3D models for characters (structures as well, but importing a 2D design of the character you're turning into 3D just makes the job so much easier).

The only thing close to "concept art" I've found are the 3D models. That's not concept art.


Until someone shows me hand-drawn (this also means it can be digitally hand drawn, of course) concept artwork of each of the Pals (and this also includes multiple angles; without multiple angles, it's harder for the 3D artists/animators to see all the limbs and details), I'm going to continue to hold my opinion that they either stole assets and made amalgamations by hand by mixing and mashing parts of them (which is very easy to do in Blender) or that they did, in fact, use AI to do it for them.


Honorable mention is that many of the models clash with each other; the human models sort of look alright in the background reused assets, but don't quite fit in. And the Pals don't look at all like they belong in that world due to their pokemon/cartoony/cute designs compared to the harsher (more realistic) designs of the player-character, environment, and weapons.


--


Issue #2: Ark meets Pokemon (plus guns)


There's no innovation here; nothing new. Is this what people want from video games now?

Perhaps they're so fed up with the unfinished messes AAA companies release their games that they'll settle for a buggy early access indie game which just takes concepts from two different games and puts them together.


The "devs", and this is the reason I said I hesitate to call them "devs" (and put it in quotes) even stated that they had no real inspiration or imagination for Palworld.


And seeing as how it's literally Ark with Pokemon, I totally believe that.


Which brings me back to the question of: Is this really what people want?


I wouldn't be surprised if it was, to be honest. Everything in media is getting dumbed down.

We've got anime which release in 12-episode cours and have the gall to call that a "season", then make people wait 4-6+ months for the next set of episodes (if they even wind up existing, as a lot of them are "one and done") and expect people to remember where it left off.


We've got movies and cartoons, and anime, which are getting "reboots" and "remakes" instead of seeing any original works.

We've got games playing off of each other and offering little innovation (see: all the farming sim games).

The last game I can think of which I'd call "innovative" was Undertale; due to its wacky cast of characters, lore and background, different paths and endings, and the ability to go through an RPG without having to kill a single monster (mostly).

The last anime I can recall which fell under "innovative" was Fullmetal Alchemist.


So of course, that applies to video games. It reminds me of that Loud House episode where Luna wants to enter into that idol contest and is trying to figure out what sort of song to do. Instead of entering her original rock song, she winds up going with a bubblegum pop genre song which even has the lyrics of:

"Everybody loves this

Everybody does this

I'm just gonna do it too.

We don't need a new song,

We already got one

I'm just gonna give you

What everybody wants."


That's exactly what we're seeing here. Palworld doesn't bring a single new concept to the table, and even the "devs" admitted that. They know what people have been asking for and wishing for in a Pokemon game, looked at the popularity of survival games (and Ark), and combined the two. Give it a generic "bad guy team doing bad stuff which needs to be defeated", and they've even got a "plot".


I'm not saying it's a wrong mindset; I'd love to see a Pokemon farming sim spinoff, or ranching/breeding spinoff. And I absolutely have loved Pokemon Snap since I played the first version waaaay back on the N64. Certainly, those aren't innovative.


And I don't blame the "devs" of Palworld for just putting out a game which people want, but I call BS on them acting surprised at how well it sold. They took nostalgia value from pokemon designs, then mashed up the idea of pokemon/creature capture and combined it with another popular genre (survival games, which Ark definitely dominates in).


What puts me off of this is that it makes me sad. I acknowledge their plan, but as a game dev, it's sad that this is what gaming has come down to: Reused assets, reused ideas (you won't be able to convince me it isn't literally Ark with Pokemon), ect...all with a hefty $30 USD pricetag on it for an Early Access...

Yea, the "devs" knew exactly what they were doing for making money.

I doubt they made this game because of what people have been saying about Pokemon; if they did, then it'd have a cheaper pricetag (especially for Early Access; never spend more than $20 on an Early Access game. Ever.).

This was more than likely 99% "let's make money without a single original thought".


--


Finally, Issue #3: This game is dark af


This is a two-part issue.

The first is with the treatment of the Pals.

Apparently, you can butcher Pals (for food?). You can be all nice and pet them, then whip out an axe and slaughter them (which the "devs" thankfully blur, but it's still just as horrific).


That's worse than the pig scene in Silver Spoon (anime/manga). I know "circle of life" and all that, but why can't there just be fish in these worlds that people eat? Non-Pal fish with low enough sentience.


...this is probably why I don't play survival games; I can't even bring myself to attack a virtual deer. I think if the creature designs were more "realistic" (think Monster Hunter), I would have been more interested in it since in that case it feels like you're fighting monsters, and not cute little animals.


I love animals, and if I was in the Pokemon world I'd be a researcher because I wouldn't be able to stomach making/allowing these (mostly) cute buddies fight until they're either too exhausted to continue or too wounded to continue.


Next is the "sweatshop" feel. You put your Pals to work on your base. They build stuff for you, water crops, make things, ect. You as the player don't have to lift a finger because you've got these unpaid little creatures doing all the work for you.


One can say that, even in the Pokemon world, they do this; such as using Machoke to help with moving, and various fighting and ground types to help with construction.

(in the case of Chansey/Audino, they seem to enjoy helping out in Pokemon Centers as nurses)

What we don't see, unless a bad guy is doing it, is these pokemon being worked to the point of exhaustion/death.


In Palworld, it's possible to overwork them (not to mention that "workplace hazards" are a thing as they can be set on fire if they walk through flames) to apparently death. While that does bring in a realistic aspect, that it can happen on screen and that some players are even willing to do it is dark and concerning.


I mean, my country (North America/USA) has never even really gotten out of the "we should have slaves" mindset despite the fact that we had an entire war over it.

So to see some Youtubers/Streamers purposely treat their Pals as slaves and make them work nonstop (or to death) is disturbing, and I really don't feel like it should be in a video game.


Onto the second part:


This goes along with the first part, but you can apparently catch people in those pokeballs (whatever they Palworld equivalent of their name is), and enslave them as well. I saw a short video of someone who put one of those humans in a "zoo" sort of enclosure after making them work.


I just...it was bad enough that there are on screen repercussions for overworking Pals (aka, treating them as slaves), but also for other humans...


It's this "sweatshop/slavery" issue which honestly is the one which made me say "I'm never getting this game".


In conclusion, while it does look like a fun game (not going to lie about that), there are too many moral/ethical problems that is has for me to even remotely support it.


Again, if you play it (and especially if you treat your Pals right and don't enslave the humans in that world) and enjoy it then I'm not dissing you or trying to make you feel bad.


But I personally wouldn't be able to bash a cute little sheep or chicken (especially since the chicken one looks so similar to the ones I've gotten used to seeing and raising with loving care in games like "Story of Seasons") with a club to weaken it, or pet it lovingly one moment and then butcher it in the next.


I play nuzlockes...and yes, I get hit in the feelz every time I lose a pokemon (some have even made me cry), and they don't even on-screen die.


All in all, my critical thoughts on Palworld is: It's uninspired/lazy, there's a lot of sus on the creature designs (which are tweaked just enough to stave off a lawsuit), and it has some very dark aspects (such as slavery).

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With the Indigo Disk dropping tomorrow, I figured I would finally cover the reason why I'm going to put together a team of level 100 pokemon specifically for steamrolling Kieran.


This is not something I usually do. Rather, I like nuzlocking at every given opportunity. I also prefer to stay within the level limit (and at worst, going no higher than 5 levels over).

However, Kieran does not deserve that respect.


There were mixed opinions of him coming out of the Teal Mask, but overall most people tended to be on the same side I wound up on: Started out liking him (and hating Carmine), and at the end liked Carmine and hated Kieran.


Obviously, this contains SPOILERS for the TEAL MASK.


AGAIN, SPOILER WARNING!


READ AT YOUR OWN RISK.


So, here are the top three reasons why I hate Kieran so much:


1: He throws himself a pity party claiming to be the victim of exclusion

I've been excluded before. In elementary school, despite being athletic, I was picked last for teams because I wasn't popular enough. I wasn't allowed in any of the "secret clubs" back then, either.

In middle school, I recall one incident in science class (my favorite/best class). It started out like any other lab where we'd partner up. Only, the two "friends" I usually partnered with suddenly didn't want me on their team anymore (and became bullies after that because I was "weird"...aka, autistic, only we didn't know I was on the spectrum back then). I tried asking other groups, but nobody wanted me in their group.

Literally the entire class said "no", and I was left standing in the middle of the room, fighting against tears (because I made it a point to never cry in school) and feeling like a freaking idiot. The teacher actually had to step in and ask (more of tell) a group to let me in with them.


THAT is what being excluded looks and feels like. Kieran was pissed off and upset that he was left out of the loop, and made it sound like he was constantly excluded and we were laughing about him behind his back (despite how Carmine pushed for us to be friends, and though she yelled at him, her intentions were good).


I was excluded because of bullying; it doesn't even compare to being left out of the loop (yep, been there too), and it's disgusting that he tries to claim we're maliciously excluding him and he's some sort of poor victim.


--


2: His entitlement (especially with Ogerpon)

Kieran admired the strength Ogerpon represented (and the fact that the story made her out to be a serial killer doesn't do him any favors for worshipping the ogre), and because of his love of what she represented, he felt that he was entitled to her.


So, he got jealous of us. Not just in regards to Ogerpon, but when your legendary draggo pops out of its pokeball upon the mention of a sandwich, even back then he mentions how it seems like you're the "main character" or "special". His jealousy was showing all the way back during the first sign.


So when Ogerpon saw how friendly we were to her and how we fought off the (un)Loyal Three to get her masks back, and thus decided she wanted to come with us...Kieran ignored her wishes and tried to forcefully take her.


If I'd had an option in the game, I would have told him "no" for the battle. Carmine even admonishes him for not considering Ogerpon's feelings, and he just could care less.


While I can understand the feeling of jealousy that someone else gets something you've wanted, there's also respecting the feelings of Ogerpon...which he doesn't do.


He even stole her mask, knowing the entire story and how important it was, to blackmail us into battling him. He says he knew it was wrong, but he did it anyway...because he felt entitled to getting his way.


And when he didn't get his way, well...


--


3: His tantrums

He's at least 14 years old, goes to a school which is the most competitive battling facility in Unova, and acts like a four year old when he loses. His behavior is unacceptable for his age. Do they not teach sportsmanship over at Blueberry Academy?


Even after we "shake hands and make up", we battle him again...and what does he do after that? Falls to the ground and throws a tantrum, then runs off in a snit after we catch Ogerpon and doesn't even show up to say goodbye to us.


This here is not a "misunderstood teenager going through teenage angst"; this here is a spoiled brat.


And no; he was NOT abused by Carmine. As an abuse survivor, I'm dispelling that notion right here and now and I don't want to hear about it from anyone because it's a middle finger to people who were legit abused.

They're siblings. They have sibling energy. Did Carmine handle things properly? Hell no! But she didn't freaking abuse him.


--


I saw someone compare Kieran to the "guy who stalks a girl he admires, gets rejected, and then forcefully tries to take her anyway"...and I can't argue that analogy. That's literally what he tries to do to Ogerpon.


He got angry at us, someone he met the other day, for withholding the truth about Ogerpon at first because we were pressured by his grandfather (an adult of a family we had just met and had no reason to interfere in their business) to do so. Should he have been told?


Eh...maybe. At first, it feels bad to not tell him. After he flies off the handle and compares himself to the lonely Ogerpon with his pity party, we get to see exactly why his grandfather didn't want him to know about it (and Carmine didn't want to initially tell him during the festival because she didn't want him wandering up a mountain at night).


And when Kieran doesn't get what he wants (to hear the story from us), he then starts lamenting about how he's so alone (despite the villagers having good things to say about him, meaning that he's obviously popular there...yes, I talk to NPCs) and how everyone lies to him and-or laughs about him behind his back (paranoid, much?)...


...and then goes on to steal something important and disregard a pokemon's feelings just to get his way.


He's an emo edgelord brat whose attitude actually ruined my enjoyment of Kitakami (all his whining and complaining about his Main Character Syndrome and everything else wore on my nerves). It wasn't until I played through it a second time on an alt account that I was able to just spam through his dialogue and enjoy my time in Kitakami...so now I like it there.


I'm not going to let him do that for the Indigo Disk. I don't want to hear a word from him, and I just don't care. The game/story is probably going to force us to reconcile with him but I'm already over it.


So when it comes to Kieran, I'm just going to go in with a full team built specifically for his team (out of pokemon I've already trained, that is), and his team will be the only thing I look up/get spoilers on in order to do that (if I need to...I went into the Teal Mask with no spoilers and had no problems with him)...

...because I don't like him, his demeanor and entitlement pisses me off, and I refuse to let him ruin another DLC by being a brat.


Kudos to the writers for making a "rival" we can hate, but they went a little overboard with him.

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So, everyone probably knows that there was a major "blackout" of subreddits (from major ones to smaller ones) Monday & Tuesday to protest the monetized API rollout Reddit's CEO is planning on implementing by the end of June (which would cause a lot of 3rd party apps moderators of subreddits use to access the site to close down).


This...I never understood it. Some of the subreddits are still in that mode (private only; people can't view or post). FFXIV is one of them, which irks me.


The protest itself is fine, but what bothers me is how Reddit users went about doing it. Even though the entire site crashed on Monday because of the blackout, since not all of Reddit did it and it only lasted two days, the CEO's mind remains unchanged.


Well, of course the CEO isn't bothered! Not every subreddit participated, and people still have their PAID MEMBERSHIPS. Why should they care if some subreddits go down for a couple days?


If people really wanted to protest it, they should have encouraged everyone to unsub from Reddit's member stuff and anything else that would give Reddit money...because money talks.


The couple times I ever saw a successful protest against a large corporation involved the mass unsubbing from consumers. A long time ago, when Blizzard first paired with Activision, they attempted to replace our usernames with our real names on the forums. This was before Twitter and FB, and generally people weren't posting about their location or what they looked like too often. There were safety concerns, especially for people with uncommon names.


So what'd we do? The majority of us who played WoW unsubbed and posted about it in a thread on the forums. We spoke with our wallets, and Activision-Blizzard lost so much of the playerbase (and subscription fee income) that they walked back that change.


The second time I saw a protest work was more recently against WotC, when they attempted to cash in on user-generated content for Dungeons & Dragons. There was a lot of backlash over them changing things and trying to monetize it, but what grabbed their attention and got them to stop was a combination of major Youtubers/Streamers stating that they were going to be switching to Paizo (Pathfinder) if it kept up...

...and, of course, when people unsubbed en masse from DnD Beyond.


So, WotC changed course and decided not to make their greedy changes.


Both instances show the same points of:

-The majority of consumers were involved in the protest

-It lasted for weeks, not just a couple days

-The corporations finally changed their minds when people spoke with their wallets


The Reddit blackout had none of those things. Unless people figured that if a group is private (and thus folks can't post anyway), the membership stuff would be useless?

I don't understand what people were thinking when they organized the blackout.

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MHA Impressions

5 min read

So, I boarded the train late and started watching My Hero Academia.

There were two main reasons it took me this long to watch it:

The first is that I'm just not a "super hero" person (despite having tried to make my own superhero comics as a kid)...

And the second was that I remember reading a later chapter when looking up a character, and it was really unnerving (it had to do with the multi-hands psycho) and immediately turned me off of it.


One of the only reasons I broke and finally watched it was that I was tired of not getting MHA references, honestly.


I actually am finding myself enjoying it more than I thought I would. I'm about five episodes into the second season, but I'm not sure I'm enjoying it as much as I was before. I'm still curious, but there are a lot of issues I have with the entire universe.


I'll try to avoid any direct spoilers, though honestly anyone reading this has probably seen the entire series or has no interest in it anyway.


So, first up is the obvious: Some of these "heroes", especially the teens learning to be heroes, do some rather unheroic things.


The biggest example of that is "Kacchan", who is only interested in being the biggest fish in the pond...but he's not the only one.


It seems just about everyone wants to be the "number one hero", which pretty much disqualifies them entirely. In the MHA world, glory seems to be a big part of being a hero as a profession, but these people will look for ways to upstage one another.


How much better would things be for the average person if instead of kill-stealing (though they aren't really killing the criminals...you know what I mean)...

...the heroes instead formed some sort of Hero Police or something and patrolled their cities in pairs?


Instead of trying to upstage each other, or stealing credit or doing whatever it takes to be "number one", why are all of them only looking out for themselves?


I dunno about you all, but my idea of a "hero" is not someone who is selfish.


Heck, one pro "hero" in the show even did some very questionable domestic things (Endeavor)...all because he's so obsessed with being "number one".


You know what would have made for an interesting plot? And maybe the corrupt world of the pro heroes will come into play later on, I don't know...

But what would have been interesting would have been, instead of this cliche "Villian League" (which sounds like there's more to it, but at the moment they're just doing stereotypical bad guy stuff), there was some Anti-Hero league or something which exposes the corrupt system of the Heroes.


Like...they only go after the selfish and arrogant heroes because let's face it: In the world of MHA, many of the heroes (pros and students) are one step shy of being trash.


What's the obsession with being "number one" and fighting one another? Like...you're on the same side, you idiots! Your enemy is the villains!


I'm expected to believe that the best hero academy in the country, particularly one which used robots as opponents in the exam, don't have some way to create drones which the kids have to fight?

I suppose having them fight each other gets them used to fighting opponents with Quirks, but a machine can emulate many of the abilities as well in order to train them as first years.

And nothing wrong with an occasional tournament or friendly combat training so they get used to fighting other people...but some of these guys in MHA have one foot over the line and seem to look forward to trying to beat the snot out of someone else.


I get "rivals". I've had rivals before, even in karate. But MHA takes it to the extreme.


Anyway, I just wanted to briefly state some of my thoughts. And I really hope that at some point in later seasons, the "heroes" who don't behave like heroes (be they the students or the pros) get called out for it.

I get that some of them are necessary to create day-to-day antagonists (and rivals) for Deku, and it's difficult to have a "school life" section without at least one person to stir up trouble. There are other ways to go about that, too, without having these anti-heroes who call themselves heroes (or heroes in training).


One of the reasons I'm still watching is because I enjoy seeing Deku having to outsmart the others since he can't control his power yet. It's really cool to have a shounen protagonist who actually can think; and not just think, but use strategy.

There are some other fun and quirky (pun possibly intended) characters, but I feel like I still don't know enough about them (heck, I can't even name them) because things are generally chaotic in the show...and there are so many characters that it's already hard to keep up with them.


...and that was before the anime introduced the B class. Oysh. I get they have an inferiority complex, but yea; some of my "they sure don't act like heroes" comes from some of them as well.


Again, it seems rather foolish of the entire hero organization to have them competing against each other constantly instead of working together so that they can better respond (and do so faster) when a crime is committed or a disaster occurs and people need to be rescued.


Just sort of a head scratcher on that one. Gotta wonder if having Quirks takes away from their ability to use critical thinking. >.>

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So, unless you aren't into video games or have been living under a rock (hey, no shame in living under a rock), there's even more controversy lately over the Hogwarts Legacy game.


It had controversy from the get-go due to the fact that Rowling is getting royalties from the game (which is the reason I didn't buy it. If she had gotten a flat fee for use of her created world, I might have considered it as the damage had already been done. But royalties...I can't).


And since Rowling is highly anti-trans...well, a lot of people have distanced themselves from the HP-verse ever since that came to light a couple years ago.


Personally, I feel that it's okay to still like the world of Harry Potter by separating creator from creation...just as long as she isn't profiting off of it.

And, yea...the royalties she gets from Hogwarts Legacy are a mere drop in the ocean, but that's a drop she can put towards that AFAB woman's shelter and other trans-excluding movements she donates to.


But that's not the current controversy. The current controversy is something I'm sure everyone has heard about: The streamer bullying.


What's happening is that one streamer was streaming Legacy, and then claimed that she was bullied so badly that she had to take a break from the stream because it sent her into tears.

So, this caused a bunch of other streamers to jump to her defense and rile up their chat/base to be extra hateful towards the "haters".

Some streamers, who don't even usually stream games like Legacy, started to stream it just to spite the "haters"...and of course, posted videos on Youtube and commented about the bullying situation on their streams which further riled their communities.


But the underlying story?

There was no bullying.


The posted examples of supposedly the "worst" of the bullying in that initial stream were just comments to the extent of:

"I'm disappointed in you."

"I thought you were an ally. Now I feel alone because you're not."

"This channel isn't what I thought it was. I'm unsubbing."

"(hashtag) TransRights!"


...


That's it.

That's the so-called "bullying".

My bet is that the streamer cried because she was losing subs and did not expect such backlash. Because if anyone considers that bullying...well, they've never been bullied before in their life.

If all my bullies did was say things like that, I wouldn't have been as scarred by them.


Perhaps 1% are actually going around calling people Nazis or transphobes for playing Legacy, but from what I've seen and found via Google searches...it's the opposite.


Even negative reviews for the game on Steam, ones which don't even mention the controversy and stay true to reviewing the game as a video game, are being attacked. A couple reviews have some disgusting anti-LGBTQ+ comments, to boot.


Communities, particularly the ones being riled by these streamers jumping to the defense of the supposedly bullied streamer, are turning into the bullies and taking things a step further by being downright nasty towards anyone who boycotted the game.


One streamer, one I used to enjoy watching who streamed mostly FFXIV content, posted a clip of one of her streams where she handled it poorly. She went off on all the supposed bullies (remember, there wasn't really any bullying), and what caused me to unsub was when she said that "anyone who points out the Jewish stereotype in the goblins are antisemitic and are conspiracy theorists".


That's like accusing the people who called out blackface as being racist.

Even before Jon Stewart made the comment about the goblins not too long ago, people made the connection between the goblins and the Jewish stereotype. As someone who had been raised Jewish, the first movie made me notice it.


People who see the goblins as possibly being Jewish stereotypes are not antisemitic; they're aware of the stereotype and are calling it out.


But basically, I felt like I was being called antisemitic by a streamer who bought into a false narrative of "bullies" and "cruel LGBTQ+ haters" and went off on not just the supposed "bullies", but everyone else.


Look, if someone wants to play Hogwarts Legacy, that's fine. I'm super disappointed in them, but it's their choice and I'm not going to say more than that to them (unless they start retweeting Rowling's garbage...then I'll have an issue with it).


But if streamers start rallying their communities to be cruel to those of us who made a choice not to get the game...that's not okay. I mean, heck...I watched another streamer play it, and he was chill and didn't call anyone out on either side. His chat was also very chill about it.


This is a topic which will cause hurt feelings, and will get people riled up due to the discrimination LGBTQ+ folks face. And certainly, people are allowed to tell a streamer straight up that they're disappointed or feel like the streamer isn't an ally if that streamer is contributing towards Rowling's royalty check (and thus, any anti-trans agenda she spends that money on).


It's not okay to call someone a bigot or a Nazi for playing the game. Nor is it okay to accuse someone of being anti-trans for playing the game.

Flip side, it's not okay to rile up a community against people who took a moral stand against getting the game...nor is it okay to call them antisemitic for pointing out a stereotype.


In the end, this all started essentially because a streamer couldn't handle the backlash of being a public figure; of criticism from her disappointed community. She cried wolf (or bullying, in this case), and both she and her boyfriend perpetuated the situation to the point where other streamers jumped to their defense and riled up their own communities against the so-called bullies.

Which, in turn, has created even more hate towards LGBTQ+ folks as the entire LGBTQ+ community is being blamed for the outrage (and again, if there was any harassment, it was by those few bad apples and probably on Twitter...which is a cesspool of toxicity on a good day).


I mean, if someone wants to point out a few nasty tweets, even that won't change my mind about this because a few nasty tweets won't undo what I saw all those people in chat saying; all the "discussions" on places like Reddit echoing hatred towards the LGBTQ+ community and anyone who refused to contribute to Rowling's royalty check.

(seriously, please don't post any links to Twitter)


Even when I went looking for it, I found way more examples of hatred caused by the streamers and their riled up "this streamer can do no wrong, we're behind you all the way" communities than I did from the so-called bullies.


I just want to state that I'm not claiming there isn't any nastiness out there. There are bad apples in every bunch, so I'm sure that there are some nasty tweets and maybe reddit as well. I went looking for them, but could only find the opposite even with keywords.


This is why it's important to double-check sources; to look things up and find multiple sources as well...to not just take a call to action at face value because sometimes, like in the case of the not-really bullying here, it was blown out of proportion...and now it's too big to stop what is happening due to the riled up communities spurred on by these streamers who did not bother to do any research first (or were maybe told by a handful of their viewers that aforementioned viewers are disappointed and are unsubbing, or feel like they lost an ally).

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