Return of the Naruto Community Derail Thread: Part Two!

...I swear, I can't think of the last time I've heard of a positive story out of your country. No offense. Like, the comparatively most positive thing I can think of in recent years is "I like some music artists"... but then again, a good chunk of that music culture is repackaging black American music without the black people.

...damn. I hadn't thought of or noticed this, but I can absolutely see it now that you mention it.

Happy new year, all!

I just had a fun couple Animorphs related dreams. For both of them, I'm Tobias (the human stuck most of the time as a hawk).

1. Sequel to a dream from a couple months ago. Last time I had to lure a girl who had an unrequited crush on me to some weird waterfall/abandoned mall thing so I could let her gently and safely away from other people in case she activated any special powers. This time I had to lure a couple classmates, the yugioh monsters Vampire Lord and Vampire Lady, to the same place to make him let her down gently. For some reason we attend a school for different humanoid monsters, and I can shapeshift into a bat, making it easier to talk to all the vampires on friendly terms and while being immune to their mind contol. However he refuses to hear me out before she gets there, leading to us getting into a three way fight, up until Edward Elric appears to help me out (and I morph into Alphonse.
2. Back to an all human school, that somehow also is a wildlife reserve and has a large children's playground. I beat a couple poachers with advice from one of my college professors (who is now also an Animorph) on how to entrap them. All is fine for like an hour, until I find out there are 2 other alien species simultaneously trying to invade Earth, beyond the main Animorphs enemy, the body snatching Yeerks. One species can shapeshift into humans and included the poachers' leader. The other was a species of... the enemy from a certain movie from last year, Jean Jacket from Nope. There is a UN conference at our high school. Somehow by causing a smaller version of the flood I used to reset the world in another previous dream, I'm able to expose both new species, but not the regular canon Yeerks, bringing us back to the status quo vanilla guerrilla warfare. Only this time, most humans are now on guard against other aliens that may look like human. Also, the Animorphs now somehow know how the book series ended, so they can go into future battles more efficiently. And they copied the shapeshifter aliens' default form and ability to look like any human they've seen in person.

What are animorphs?

Animorphs - a book series about 6 high schoolers given the power to turn into animals, in order to fight a guerrila war against a secret invasion of body snatching alien brain slugs who have used their hometown as a major launching point to try to take over the world.

Also, for some reason, the latter dream was stated to be set in the late 40s, despite everything else suggesting it took place in the 90s as the earliest. One character even points out the hole in the ozone layer hasn't formed yet.

The Animorphs was a very popular set of teen novels in the late 90s/early 2000s. It's about a bunch of kids fighting off an invasion of body snatcher alien slugs using the power to shapeshift, which they got from a different species of alien. They can only shapeshift for two hours at a time or they get stuck in that form forever, which happened to one of them. Wander's dream was about that character.

The alien slugs are actually surprisingly sympathetic, btw. What the hell else are you going to do when you're a blind and barely mobile but highly intelligent slug that lives in muddy pools their whole lives?

Having a fun dream is nice. Waking up and writing it down from 430 to 530 am when you're not fully rested is not so nice. My head hurt a bit while I was writing, and I didn't wake up as easily as I wanted to when it was actually time for work.

What a weird timeline to be a Shining Force fan... The original Shining Force game was one of my earliest and favorite games played. But the sequels to that game weren't as easy to find. Then the original developers left SEGA, and went on to develop Golden Sun and the Mario Golf franchise, among other things. SEGA did put out some games that were pretty much Shining Force In Name Only, but even that part of the franchise has been dead for like 10 years.

Then out of nowhere in August 2021, a trailer is revealed for a Shining Force mobile gacha game. I've never played a gacha game, but as with my passing interest in (the Fodlan characters in) Fire Emblem Heroes, I like the characters and setting enough to have some interest.

I didn't actually find out about the game until Feb 2022. Then I heard it was cancelled a couple months later, apparently because the developer lost a lot of money on its own bubble and couldn't keep up its end of the deal.

But now I'm finding out they put out a second trailer a couple weeks ago in hopes of finding another developer/publisher to buy and finish it, since it was close to done, and they want to recoup some of those expenses.

This kind of turmoil even before launch does not inspire a lot of confidence, especially for a gacha game that may not get a lot of support... but I'm still hopeful the franchise isn't dead.

Edited by wanderlustwarrior on Jan 11th 2023 at 3:32:29 AM

Changing into animals to fight alien slugs. Huh, that's an original premise, I'll give them that.

Espionage is a big part of the premise. Also, so long as the main characters aren't in human form, they are capable of using "Thought Speak", telepathic communication to the outside world.

Edited by wanderlustwarrior on Jan 11th 2023 at 9:18:44 AM

"This mission will require utmost stealth. Time to change into a bear!"

A bear was one of the most important attack morphs, but flight capable morphs were also very important, as were small morphs that could sneak into places so that they could change back. Oh, also, turning into another species and back heals all non-genetic injuries sustained in either form. They could also turn into specific other humans they've touched when in their default form, or even make new human forms by amalgamations of people. And most of the important work was done in human form, but they had the need for other forms they could at least attack the enemy in while not being recognizable, lest said aliens simply find and possess one of their family members and hold them hostage, or corner them when they're unaware, or something.

Also, take this from the series' description on the trope page:

Edited by wanderlustwarrior on Jan 12th 2023 at 2:59:07 PM

Sounds pretty well though out, actually. I can see why it became popular.

And also they had one member dedicated to being as boring as humanly possible so that everyone else could be fun.

They do have a bit of help beyond just those powers.

• They can also morph into any of the other alien species, some of which have natural weapons.
• They eventually get a Do-Anything Robot friend, but he and his race have been programmed to not use any of their immense powers to cause harm to anyone, or let it be caused on their behalf.
• Their conflict is a tiny part of an overall galactic chess match between to effective gods. The god on their side is a bit more attached to them personally than the god on the other side, so while both bend the rules from time to time, the one on their side does it in ways that more directly benefit the Animorphs.
• Their enemy is generally averse to open warfare. (Did we ever figure out why, by the way? Beyond "Visser Three is too cocky" and the limitations of Yeerk biology)

I figure you're either talking about Cassie or Ax? Both of them came in clutch multiple times, though!

Edited by wanderlustwarrior on Jan 14th 2023 at 10:15:05 AM

Cassie. Ax at least gets to be a blue centaur with a scorpion tail.

Visser 3 is basically following orders when it comes to avoiding open conflict, I think. The Yeerks would easily win a full on war but they'd kill a lot of people in the process, which is not helpful given the whole reason they're there to begin with.

Edited by Arha on Jan 14th 2023 at 10:25:58 AM

I still found she had value and brought something to the team. It was Marco whose role I questioned the most. Probably because I skipped a lot of stories in the ghostwritten era, including some of his plot developments.

Today I made Suki, Ty Lee, Bayonetta and Angewomon in Soul Calibur VI. Maybe tomorrow I'll give Link and Ganondorf a shot. I already found a great Zelda online a while back. I wish there was a way the playerbase could vote on top creations so that those get saved, instead of older ones being lost to time. Fortunately I've saved some of the ones I found most inventive, like the Megazord or the Dark Magician.

Edited by wanderlustwarrior on Jan 14th 2023 at 1:16:47 PM

It doesn't matter if Cassie is useful for not, what matters is whether she's an interesting perspective to follow. She's just the group's moral compass so it's like it's her actual job to be the least fun person around.

It's always interesting to see people arguing about a series you didn't read. All those strong opinions on something I have no knowledge of.

I didn't find her boring to follow, tbh.

Does this happen to you often?

Okay, I saw some creative custom characters on Soul Calibur today: Whitebeard, Dr. Faust from Guilty Gear, Hsien-ko and Felecia from Darkstalkers, Tharja from Fire Emblem... And all from different people. So I decided to finally upload one of my own, and went with I think the first crossover character I ever made, Ruby Heart from Marvel Vs Capcom 2. And I did indeed make Ganondorf, and am happy with how he turned out.

Jan 16: I made Q-Bee, Lilith and Morrigan from Darkstalkers.

Edited by wanderlustwarrior on Jan 16th 2023 at 4:01:28 AM

Same here.

Unfortunately, for me it even applies to really popular works like Smash Bros franchise as well. Yes, I never played that game - practically NOBODY plays that here^note  For fighting game, Tekken series dominates the market and as for casual group game it's either Starcraft or League of Legends - and probably never will due to lack of energy. XP

Edited by dRoy on Jan 16th 2023 at 8:31:23 PM

From time to time I guess. I'm often not up to date on popular shows and the like, so when my friends discuss them I'm left being lost.

It's all just torrent on names and opinions I lack the context for.

Anything that has to do with television I'm lost on whenever it comes up. Did that one guy ever manage to break bad? Is it one of the days of the week or someone from the Addams family dancing? The world may never know.

The world may never know... or at least the part of it that constitutes Arha.

Well, I'm not quite that out of the loop, but I often find myself in similar situation. I usually find out about a new tv show when my friends tell me about it. Like with that Wednesday show.

This is, mostly unedited, an actual scene in an anime. And I thought Yugioh was Serious Business.

The actual episode (scene occurs at about 3:30)