The Winter Court of the Insane, Philosophical Ladybug

For the last several weeks, I've known that MoonlightTyger would be coming out here for a day trip to a favorite theme park. I was invited to come with her and her sister and her friend, but wasn't sure until a few days ago that it would work out. And me being me, I stayed skeptical still worrying it wouldn't work out right up to the end and finally allowed myself to get excited the night before.

The rides to and from were very fun. We all have a lot of common interests, so it was neat talking about them and listening to the music they had brought. It took less time driving than I thought it would too, only about an hour instead of closer to ninety minutes! That was great for arrival times, but I was sad when it was time to say Goodbye so soon!

I've honestly never been to a theme park. The closest I've ever come is the state fair a couple of times and some carnivals for various holidays. It was a pretty amazing experience! It was all decked out for Halloween with hanging pumpkins and Jack-O-Lanterns and pretty lights and silly fake gravestones everywhere. I get motion-sick on almost any rides and sometimes still in the car, so I knew coasters were not a good idea. But my main deal was wanting to go in haunted houses, since due to Dad being a chronic Halloween Grinch, that's also something I've never done. And I kind of hoped I might find something awesome on the midway, since I know licensed character plushies turn up at the games on those.

I saw the licensed character booth on our way in, with Pokemon and Mario characters. I immediately wanted a big Daisy I saw hanging there. Ironically, I don't think I've ever played a game with her, except maybe Mario Party. But I love her personality, and of course I'm tickled her name is Daisy. We decided to do the attractions first.

There were several haunted attractions and I chose a couple that sounded creepy but not uncomfortable. Like one I rejected said it featured the devil. No. So MoonlightTyger and I tried a nice mansion. There was a hallway with those silly, creepy pictures that look normal and change to skeletons or zombies, lol. Then there were various freaky rooms. My favorite was a library with a fireplace and a kitty. At first it looked like a dead end, but MoonlightTyger finally saw the dark hallway to go down. There was eventually a mad scientist and a weird elevator operator. There was some disgusting imagery along the way, but I'd figured long ago there likely would be since a lot of people seem to like making Halloween gory. So I had managed to brace myself for that. It was fun and over all too soon, lol. (Of course, I'm sure MoonlightTyger was relieved it was over!)

I had also wanted to try a haunted ghost town. The website made it sound like it was outside and walking around to different buildings that were haunted, but it was all indoors. It was longer, being a whole town set-up, and to my surprise it was gorier than the regular haunted house. The outlaw ghosts were fun and very plunnying. There were freaky animatronics, like one floating over a cemetery, and something that looked like a scarecrow wielding a scythe. The church had ghosts rocking in the pews. So creepy! I got some nice imagery from both houses to use in fics, and I hope to get on that right away.

We walked around the regular town set-up, which had restored buildings from pioneer days. So cool! I love things like that. There was a church, a house, some cabins, and a main street of businesses. One had a miniature circus and lots of dolls on display. Some super old plushies too. It looked like the images were painted onto a cloth body shaped like the animal. Fascinating!

On the midway, MoonlightTyger and I played Whac-a-Mole. She was amazing at it! I don't know whether I was doing something wrong or if the machines just weren't registering me so well. I was hitting every thing, but it consistently gave me low scores. But since MoonlightTyger was getting a perfect score, we won and she won the Daisy for me! Squeee. Daisy is so soft. I should have brought my Disney tote bag along from my backpack just in case of winning something as I had hoped, but I hadn't been sure it would fit in the smaller red bag I had decided to carry through the park and left it in the backpack instead. So I just carried Daisy in my arms for the rest of the trip.

Throughout all of this, MoonlightTyger's sister and friend wanted to ride a particularly scary coaster twice and go on a water ride. Then we all regrouped and all three were able to go on MoonlightTyger's favorite ride when the lines were short! I knew I didn't dare try a coaster, so I watched their stuff and texted with Crystal for a bit.

To finish, we went in the gift shop and I found a hilariously adorable bookmark and pen set of a gray kitty holding a sword. LOL. I almost freaked when I saw the manufacturer name looked like Kalin, but then I saw it was Kalan. Oh well, still close!

All in all, such a lovely experience! I love meeting dear friends in person and it was so neat to get to do something like this at long last and for it to be so close to my birthday. I'm so happy it all worked out!

With things still upsidedown here, I haven't been sure Dad would even be able to go out and select anything for my birthday, and I certainly didn't want to impose and ask, so I decided the best idea would be for me to get a few things for myself when I was getting groceries and such. I still wanted a nice birthday, and knowing everything I'm getting (aside from friends' gifts) is better than getting nothing. I bought a couple of things a few weeks ago and put them away for that, and I got a bit more this past week. I'm also, of course, hoping to be Radley for Halloween. I've had the most horrible time finding any fake leather jackets in American sizes that I can afford. There were only two real options: one in the right size that said it would ship in 1-2 months and might not even come in time, or one a size smaller than my usual. Of course, I took a gamble on the latter. It came yesterday! It is very soft and I hugged it. It fits if I don't close it, and Radley always wears his open anyway, so that works.

I also learned almost too late that most Disney Stores are closing. My main one was already gone by the time I was told. My uncle managed to take me to the other one last week on the very last day. There was barely anything left, and even less that was of interest to me. I finally got The Rise of Skywalker on Blu-Ray and Digital. I can use the digital code, and this will be more incentive to get a Blu-Ray player. I saw Target's mini Disney Store and was underwhelmed (but at least I heard a beautiful song, You Carried Me With You, on their screen). JCPenney has a better selection of stuff, though, honestly. And they're closer. I came home and signed up for the Disney Store website, but the prices are abominable! $20 for one doll when it used to be $12! They sent me a free shipping coupon and I was having trouble finding anything to use it on. Finally they randomly reduced the price of a Cinderella plushie and I got her. She came yesterday too! So far she's still in the mailer, as I was hoping to save her for my birthday. I might have tried to do that with the jacket too, but I felt I needed to test that immediately since the size was not my usual. (And since I was so excited by that I didn't think I could wait, lol.)

I also ordered some of the YGO 5Ds manga and it came this week too. I'm also trying to save it for my birthday. Volume 4, which is one of the ones I want most, has become mysteriously hard to get. Aurgh! So I thought I should hurry and grab the others I most wanted. 4 may come back in stock for Books a Million on the 4th, so I'll be watching that closely. I may get all nine volumes eventually.

I had a strange but nice dream of shopping in a store and finding Radley-related merchandise. Weirdly, in the dream he was a Frozen character, lol. I woke up before I fully checked out, but at least I was checking out. Many shopping dreams have me unable to complete purchases because of the stuff mysteriously disappearing. The dream felt rather true to life, as with my Halloween shopping, I do rather consider I'm buying Radley merchandise, lol. I got the wig last night with an eBay gift card and I associate the jacket with him so strongly, it felt like he was real and the jacket was an actual connection with him. Yes, I know that's nonsense. No, I don't know why this particular comfort character makes me feel that way, as I haven't for any of the others, even Marik. But there you go.

I saw a lovely top someone was wearing at the park that said "Only God can judge me." I immediately knew I had to draw Radley wearing a jacket that says that. I hope to do that today.

So Over the Nexus came last Friday and I've been playing it since then. I really feel bad to compare it to Nightmare Troubadour, because Nightmare Troubadour is great for what it is and it must always be honored as one of the only games to acknowledge the Big Five exist, but ... I have to say, most of the time, Over the Nexus does things better.

Over the Nexus lets you fully design an OC and pick a gender, instead of only designing hair length, only ever seeing a silhouette, and having the game always figure it's a boy.

There are 3D characters and beautifully rendered areas to explore, instead of just seeing aerial maps and stars for characters and not even knowing who you're going up to until you're there. It's partially an open world RPG, with so much to see and do. Even after the main story finishes, there are mini stories to play, like finding Jordan is alive but with amnesia and helping him restore his memory.

During duels, you see much bigger pictures of the characters. There's also talking back and forth during duels.

It moves faster on plot. No more dueling endlessly for in-game days before it decides you're ready for the plot to start.

The downside, however, is mandatory racing games. Why on Earth would they stick that in a battle card game?! I kind of get the reasoning, Turbo Duels and all, but if someone is playing battle cards, they might not be good a racing games too. I'm horrible at them, especially beating particular characters! You're forced to beat Breo in a race before the plot will advance, and now I'm stuck with Primo's ghost bots throwing balls at me. I can't dodge them long enough to hold out. Luckily, with the nature of the game, I can give up and go chill with Radley until I'm ready to try again. Lol. I was wrong that I couldn't see him more until the main story wraps up!

Radley is arrested in the game, which I don't like at all, but he does calm down and acts more his usual self when you visit him in jail. And I suddenly realized why he's more of a jerk during the Crash Town scene. The OC is dueling for Malcolm; of course Radley won't be friendly. Plus, he's under a ton of stress right then because Malcolm is launching an all-out war against him. I still don't think the game got his personality quite right, but looking at it in these lights, it's very forgivable.

Gah, though, when you visit him, he says sadly, "I wanna go home soon." **hugs him!** He perks up if you want to duel. During the duel, when your lifepoints drop a lot, he says, "Give it your best!" Squeeee. If he wins, he says, "Give it up. It's pointless to strive so hard." Which is just heartbreaking when you think he may be saying that because he fought so long and so hard against Malcolm and lost everything. I like that the game kept that he sounds rather educated and/or philosophical.

Meanwhile, Malcolm is so incredibly childish. He actually carved up his bar counter with, "Ramon is an idiot." ROTFLOL! I had to show that happening in a fic because it's just too funny. I can imagine Radley would have some snarky comment to make on Malcolm's itty-bitty intelligence if he ever found out.

The game really fleshes out Crash Town and shows some fun OCs. I love all the new characters. It even made one of Malcolm's main stooges interesting. If he wins a duel, he says, "You know best why you lost." If he loses, he says, "There's a lesson to be learned in losing." In the anime he's just a generic brute. There's also a low-level Crewmember who's adorably nervous and worried about the mine being a volcano that might erupt. Aww.

Overall, I am just in love with this game and I see why it's so sought-after. I think any YGO fan would probably enjoy it, not just 5Ds fans, because of the improvements in gameplay.

Meanwhile, on Duel Links, the Duke event is go! I'm thrilled we have him, but I do have some mixed feelings. They're doing the manga, and I'm glad people will get to see how amazing Duke's manga intro is, but the manga-ka really forgot about him after the intro. Duke has more screentime in the anime, so I'm sad that that aspect will be forgotten here. And it feels like they're playing up the negative side of his personality, like he keeps challenging people with, "Loser does whatever the winner wants for a week." And they had Marc Thompson voice him like in the anime intro episodes, so on a lot of lines he sounds snooty and arrogant. On the upside, though, he has the most adorable losing lines. He's a better sport than most of the characters, honestly. Like he'll say, "So I lost, but I sure had a good time losing." Awww! And he does show he feels awful for what he did during the manga intro; he keeps apologizing to people. I am anxious to get enough points to unlock him.

On Saturday I was over the moon!

( Cut for Mandalorian spoilers )

I had to watch that episode as soon as I learned about it, of course. I've been waiting to see if anything would be worth starting up the Disney+ subscription again, at least for a month or so, and this most certainly qualified. I pounced on it, then starting watching The Clone Wars. I missed out on that when Netflix had it, so I'd better get my fill this month. I can probably only keep Disney+ for this month. I should also try to see some DuckTales episodes. I don't have the elusive volume 4 DVD set, and it went out of print shortly after it was released, aurgh. Disney probably won't release it again because they'll figure people should just stream it on Disney+. Some people prefer physical discs!

I was not in a good mood when I started this entry, but I hoped writing about the squee would make me happy again. So far it's worked. It's hard to stay upset when writing about something that kept me on cloud 9 all that day. I was squeeing so much, I couldn't settle down to work on my fic for hours.

It's so disappointing this year that Dollar Tree doesn't have much in the way of decent DVDs. Usually they have great stuff at Christmastime, if only then. I've found anime, Scooby-Doo, and neat DC movies and TV episodes in the past. Almost everything they've had this year is lame. There was one nice Christmas movie, just a couple of DC things that didn't interest me, maybe a couple of interesting nature documentaries, and maybe a few nice things for the little kiddies, and otherwise it's second-rate trash that nobody much wants to buy. (Seriously, there are DVDs that kick around for years at Dollar Tree.)

I saw a Looney Tunes Christmas shirt last week that was kind of cute and appealed to me, with Bugs, Daffy, Wile E., and Taz in Christmas clothes. I considered getting it, but didn't, and I've had one or two dreams with the characters since then. I don't really want it that much, though, even though I like Wile E. Give me Disney any day over Looney Tunes (although some of the old Disney shorts are rather mean-spirited too).

I really kind of want those re-issues of The Real Ghostbusters figures for Christmas, but they're almost $15 for one, so I know Dad wouldn't want to get them. Plus, figures from the movie are out right now too, and ten to one he'd get confused and might get the wrong thing. The cartoon figures were almost all gone again tonight too. I considered getting one with some cash of Mom's and then having her keep it until Christmas, but I don't really want to do that. It seems ridiculous to have to buy my own presents, even if I'd be using her money instead of mine. The only Egon left had a grease mark too. Looking on eBay, he seems to be the hardest to get too. That figures.

At least someone was finally at the fabric counter while there was black cotton to be cut. I'll make Kalin's clothes this week, probably.

I really couldn't resist and I ordered that second commission. It came in this morning! http://fav.me/ddfscsf This time I waited to post here until it was up on dA so I could just post the dA link. Then there can be recorded views and favorites.

I just love ElfBean's work! I have definitely found my perfect commission artist! I can't imagine commissioning anyone else at this point. I am pretty amazed I found her after weeks of looking for someone to commission YGO art from. I finally did a search on dA for Yu-Gi-Oh! Commission and went through a lot of different results before stumbling on her site.

Of course, the natural progression of things is to now commission Lector waking up. I really do need to hold off for a couple of weeks, at least, to wait for the money I earned to come in and to see about the Rockapella ticket, but oh, it's going to be hard to wait! I also want at some point to commission a cute picture of Lector and Mokuba. And I'll probably get many more ideas too!

I know I'm a good artist, but I also know I could improve a lot. Someday I hope to be able to draw as good as ElfBean. Or even half as good. It's a goal to work towards. I plan to look into getting some drawing guides with complex poses and expressions and such, and maybe practicing more on backgrounds and objects, which I don't like drawing but which I really need to master, at least to a basic extent.

Lector's voice actor is on Facebook! I must ponder on what to say to him.

I should be getting my gift cards this week, and I think I know what I want to use them on. I'm thinking I'll probably get the blue 8GB Fire tablet and the Charlie's Angels boxset, the latter of which I've wanted since it came out. Right now the price is only $23, and I hope it will still be at that when the gift cards come. I just love that cheesy show of detective goodness and friendship squee! Then I'll have some more gift card money left over, and I'm thinking I might get the It's a Miracle boxset that Netflix doesn't have. We all loved that true story show on PAX TV and we rewatch the episodes we recorded a lot. We saw the DVDs Netflix has and I've wanted to get this other set that was released. Also, I see Amazon Prime has episodes for streaming. I wonder if that's full episodes or just random segments, like the discs are. I hope it's full episodes, not that we'd ever get Amazon Prime Video.

And I was trying to look up stuff about that Kelly Garrett figure to compare it to the 1970s figure and I learned that Mego will release all six Angels eventually. And I saw a picture of Kris Monroe, who's supposed to be out this week. I'm over the moon; she looks way more accurate than the Kelly doll! Of course, I probably won't be lucky enough to find her while out this week, since stores around here are so slow, but I'll hope. And I'll probably get Kelly even though she doesn't look quite right, because I'd be sad to collect all the others and not have her. I hope she'll still be around and I'll have the chance to get her. And I wish they'd make Bosley too. I love him.

I also saw what the old 1970s dolls look like via eBay. Mego did some incredible Farrah Fawcett ones. The Hasbro one I wasn't as impressed with. And then I can't seem to see any Mego versions of Sabrina or Kelly, just the Hasbro ones. I wasn't terribly impressed by their Hasbro dolls either, although the Kelly one looked mildly more accurate than the Mego one. Why is Kelly so hard to get right? I hope modern Mego's Sabrina will look awesome.

I've been working on a YGO version of Bad End Night, that popular Vocaloid story where the characters are trapped in a nightmare world that repeats over and over again whenever they fail to save Miku from dying. My YGO version takes what I love about the story and inverts things I either didn't like so much or had thought would be told differently; for instance, while I like the novel and manga's approach of following the last time reset and revealing through it about all the past resets, it feels very detached and far away that way. I felt at least some of the failed attempts should be shown, which I'm doing with my fic. Of course, I worry that it will look ludicrous to show too many, but I try to switch things up by having different characters die each round and sometimes having a failure from simply time running out or going down the wrong path, like how puzzle games are. I keep trying to find a place to timeskip, but every time I try, I feel like I'm being too hasty and that there's more I can show. Some of the best parts have been coming out from me expanding instead of skipping. By this point, I'm wondering if it will turn into my next 20 chapter epic!

I just love my Yami Bakura figure so much. I knew I wanted him badly and was so thrilled to finally have a chance to get one. Then I wondered if he would really be as big as I was picturing, worth the price, etc. The box came and it was big. I opened it and the figure box just fit snugly inside. It was bigger than I'd thought, and so was the figure in the box! It just felt so exciting, so exhilarating, to open that box and lift the figure box out. I felt like when I was a child getting something special and long-desired in the mail or for my birthday. I haven't felt that particular thrill in a long time, although I felt it three times this year, once with him, once with my Darren McGavin figure, and once when I bought my tablet in April.

It took us a bit to get used to each other; I was a little rattled by how intense his expression really is. No pictures online can prepare you for what he really looks like! And while I certainly concede that maybe the following was my imagination because of being rattled, sometimes I believe that to some extent, the Eastern inner life theories must be true; I and others have had strange experiences with certain objects that really seem eerie. I don't believe all of these experiences are simply products of the mind, especially when it only happens with certain things and not everything a person owns. Luckily, the two oddball objects I've had (Yami Bakura and a My Little Pony named Merriweather) haven't done anything worse than give me weird feelings. They don't knock things down or do the creepy stuff some people's toys reportedly do. With Yami Bakura, I had the sense he was upset that his previous owner sold him and he wasn't sure what to make of me. He didn't seem to like me petting his hair or touching his left arm. I know how bizarre this sounds, but it's pretty mild compared to the tales others have told. After a couple of days of this awkwardness, since I still felt weird, I was desperate and hoped I didn't have a possessed figure, because if I did, I'd want to get rid of it. So I decided to approach things as though he wasn't possessed, but alive in his own inner life way, and tell him about how much I'd wanted a figure of him since I was 16 and how excited I was to finally get one when I thought I would never be able to. The other people I've talked to who have strange objects have said that they make things feel better with positive energy, or with things like burning rosemary, which is supposed to chase away negative energy. I didn't want to try burning rosemary, but I hoped that I could generate positive energy just from my love. A friend of mine was able to do that with a figure of a horse that was giving off strange vibes. And I think my Yami Bakura figure did start to like me after that little talk. And he seemed to like when I gave him a little tuxedo cat figure I have and figured it could represent Oreo. I have to admit, I also prayed and asked God if there really was anything wrong with the figure and I felt like I was told that no, there wasn't, and that I could relax. I think he's my favorite piece of merchandise I have from anything; getting a figure of him really meant a lot to me. I like to pick him up and just hold him sometimes, or lay down and play Duel Links while holding him. And yes, he's much more accepting of my affection now.

Awesome friends and family helped fix the attic, I found a tablet, and I've been playing Duel Links!

I wanted to go Best Buy to see if I could find a tablet shown on their website that they were clearancing. I don't think I found it, unless it was a different price in-store, but I found one cheaper than the Fire tablet because it was on sale (normally it's more expensive than the Fire). It's 8 inches and it's an Android system. I really felt it would be smarter to get one that already had Android stuff so I could know for a certainty things would work. I'll probably need to get a micro SD chip for it; I rather suspect by now that the stats I saw for the Steam version of the game are true for the mobile version too. On Steam it said 4GB of storage was the minimum, but 8GB was better. Which means if it is the same, it could technically fill up the whole tablet, it seems. There's a way to format micro SD so it can be part of the internal storage, so that would definitely help even if I could only get a 2GB chip. Right now the only thing I'm using the tablet for is Duel Links, which is just fine with me. Clearly I badly wanted that game since I was willing to pay $40 to get something to play it on. And since I find it completely worth it.

Wednesday was a very long day. I had insomnia, was super exhausted all day, and I have to go back to the dentist for more work. But one nice thing is that I've never been afraid of dentists since two of my brothers are dentists and I go to them.

Toys R Us ... honestly, I felt blank. They're only charging 10% off of most everything, which just makes me go WTH. K-Mart was doing 30% by now. And there was no Ladybug stuff. But they say they restock with stuff from their warehouses each day, so maybe later they'll get awesome things. Borders did that too; they had a much better inventory towards the end than they'd had for years, sadly. I'm hoping maybe they'll bring in some of the Sailor Moon figures, since they sell some online. But they'll have to bring the prices down more than 10% to make it worth it to me! At the nearest store especially, barely anything seemed to be gone. Maybe it still doesn't feel real yet, or maybe it's that for ages it's felt different than the store it was years ago, but I couldn't seem to work up any emotion while I was there.

I felt I needed to visit both Toys R Uses before deciding what to do about other things, so we went to the one an hour away after the dentist and then came down to the closer one. Best Buy was across the street and I spent a long time trying to find the tablets and then trying to decide on the best tablet. When I saw the sale price on the one, I was astounded. At first it looked like they didn't have any, but then the guy and I found one stuck in the wrong slot. I debated between it and the Fire and finally chose it for the reasons stated above. I had to wait a long time to get checked out, but everyone was really nice and so far the tablet has been really good. Hopefully it will continue to be, especially since I'm really only using it for that one thing. A 16GB would have probably been wiser, but I just couldn't afford that. As it was, I was only able to get this tablet right now because Mom was able to help me with the cost. Squeee.

My Target coupon came in right before we needed to leave, and then I couldn't get Dad's computer to cooperate to print it. But the nice lady at the dentist office let me print it there when she heard us talking about it! Since I'd already bought a tablet by the time we got to Target, I decided to check Target for the retro My Little Ponies. They were out, but I saw they had one copy of The Dark Side of Dimensions for the exact price of the gift card. I was extremely tired, hadn't seen anything else there I wanted, and I have been wanting to see that after all, for curiosity and completion's sake if nothing else, so I decided that was a great way to do it and it came home with me.

Since it's a verse all its own, not anime or manga since it contradicts both, I was able to view it as a separate entity and enjoy it for what it was. I was a little disappointed not to hear the classic gravelly Yami Bakura voice in the flashback, but I was happy to see him at all, even though it was a seriously disturbing scene. Gah. And the best line was when Yugi pulled out these weird Apple and Lemon Magician Girls and Seto exclaims, "You're fighting me with fruit?! You're mocking me!" ROTFLOL!

I found it interesting that Atem never speaks. He had so little screentime, but it was pretty epic when he showed up. I'm sure it had nothing to do with the Millennium Puzzle and everything to do with Yugi collapsing at the point of death. And I'm actually not sure that Seto went to the afterlife to see him at the end. I think now that maybe the original assessment that he went to the past is more accurate, because Atem was wearing the Puzzle, and he wouldn't have been wearing that in the afterlife.

If anyone is curious, here is what I found that contradicts the manga:

- Shadi teaching a bunch of kids about love and peace, yadda yadda. Shadi was a messed-up guy, as shown in the early manga, and he didn't understand about love and friendship. Yugi had to teach him.

- Bakura's father is not dead in the manga. Yami Bakura says in the final arc that he's the owner of the museum and that's why he, Yami Bakura, was able to get in.

I thought Joey was kind of mean to Tristan about the Duel Disk, when he starts yelling that Tristan broke it and he wants the new one. He knew that he'd asked Tristan to fix it, WTH. So it apparently wasn't broken by Tristan. But I loved the scene where Joey's memories are fading and then his memory of Atem is still there and that brings him out of the villain's world and back to reality. Very powerful! That is one of my favorite Joey scenes in any verse, I think.

I liked that it showed how the Ring warped personalities. I think that's canon to the other verses and it definitely makes Yami Bakura more sympathetic. However, what was weird is that the way they presented it, it almost looked like they were saying that the Ring only changes people but there isn't a separate entity there possessing them. We know that Zorc was in the Ring and that's why Thief King flipped out even more than he already was, and the other verses make it very clear that Bakura is being possessed by Yami Bakura; it's not just that Bakura is being corrupted by the Ring. After Zorc was destroyed, it's curious that the Ring is still a problem. I guess dark essence like that doesn't leave so easily. I'm frankly not sure Zorc can ever be destroyed, since he's the personification of the darkness in people's hearts, but that's a discussion for another time.

To be honest, even though the creator wrote the movie, it felt like a fanfiction. Things were so hand-wavy, like the contradictions with other verses and the stuff with the Ring corrupting everybody even with Zorc gone. But I had fun watching it and there were things I liked, and I'm happy to accept it as another verse. The main anime, the Toei anime, the manga, the video games, and this movie are each a separate verse. Of them all, I like the Toei anime the least, but I do remember enjoying Bakura and Yami Bakura's episodes and I should try to dig those up again.

Anyway, I'm glad I got it. I'm happy I was able to use the gift card for it!

And Duel Links.... Oh wow. So I had to wait to try it until the tablet charged for the first time, so I took a short nap out of exhaustion and then it was ready. Duel Links took a while to download and install, but they showed pictures and blurbs of all the characters and that was fun to look at. I'd had so many disappointments that I couldn't let myself believe it was really working until I logged in for the first time and got the game going.

I picked Yami Yugi as my starter, because I'd learned I had to beat Yami Bakura with him as part of the requirements for making Yami Bakura playable. And if I hadn't started with Yami Y, he wouldn't have become available until after Yami Bakura, so I had to go with him. But I was just as happy to, since Duel Links is definitely more manga-based and Seto is, hence, even more of a jerk.

It's all so fun! Most of the Standard OC duelists are okay, although I'm not crazy about Andrew, Josh, or Christine; they are very arrogant. The really little kids are adorable, especially Bella, and I like Daniel, Meg, Hailey, and ... is it Ashley? And there's one called Jess who's really nice. My favorite, though, is David. He looks like Duke's store manager, except he doesn't wear glasses, and I've headcanoned that he is Duke's store manager, wearing contacts. LOL. I haven't seen him for several Stages now. I wish he'd come back.

Things got much more interesting when canon characters started to become available, of course! I got Joey without too much trouble. Tea took a bit longer, and Mai took a lot longer. But I got to duel them until I met the requirements for making them playable.

The goal I was working on the whole time was getting to Yami Bakura, of course, although I wanted the other characters too, especially Tea. I've had a blast playing as her and Mai, and Joey too. One of the most epic duels was where Tea beat Seto in like five turns! I accidentally unlocked the GX world and Jaden, but I have no interest in that side of the game and I'm kind of glad that they're separate, LOL. I don't consider GX canon. I have nothing against the characters; it's just that I don't like the concept of a duel school and I don't like what the show did with the original characters when they popped up.

So, Yami Bakura. I wondered if he even would show up at Stage 13, because only two sites were reporting he would and other ones were still saying he was event-only. I wonder why they don't update. But to my delight and relief, yes, he was there, and so were a lot of other characters! Including Yugi! Squeee. I thought Yugi was still event-only!

My first duel against Yami Bakura was incredible. Not just because I'd longed for it for so long, but because it came out so well. I saved it and I hope to record and post it to YouTube. One requirement was to play against him using no spell or trap cards. Gah. Another was the Yami Yugi one, and I had to play with Yami Bakura being at Level 20 experience. I did both of those in the same duel, and for the first time I was able to play Slifer the Sky Dragon! It was incredibly awesome. Later that night, I had a duel with Tea playing against him, and that ended up fulfilling the requirement of winning against him with 2000 lifepoints or less. I was really wondering how to achieve that one, since you know, I wouldn't know how to go about deliberately losing lifepoints. As it turned out, I didn't have to do that deliberately, LOL. I also saved that duel.

The hardest requirement was dealing out 3000 points of effects damage to him, thankfully not all in the same duel. I have a starter card that deals 300 points, and that certainly helped, but I needed more. I got a bunch of card packs and found a couple of cards that really seemed to help. There was an awesome dragon that deals out a lot of damage if one is sent to the graveyard and you have another copy of it available to play. I built Mai's deck up with the express purpose of dealing effects damage to him. He and she had several interesting duels where they toyed with each other, dragged it out for ages, and finally Mai would get in some damage here and there when the right cards came up. The deck also worked on Joey, but Mai had very little luck using it against the Standard duelists or The Vagabond. (I'll have to change her deck around now that it's served its purpose.) Then tonight, Tea won Fire Sorceress (or is it Sorcerer? It's a girl, but it might be Sorcerer....) and I was able to give that to Mai to deal out the final points I needed! Eeeee. It was so exciting to at last see the message that he was unlocked! It is totally manga verse, as he delivered one of his creepy manga lines, but I will just pretend he didn't say that and it's anime verse instead, since anime voices are used and anime is my favorite verse. I played my first duel as him after fixing up his deck (all the characters come to me with really bad decks I have to fix), and he won! So much fun. I can hardly wait to play as him some more. I also want to unlock Ishizu and Rishid. I've been actively working towards that by playing Light cards and traps.

Oh, interestingly, people were saying that it was obvious Yami Bakura was a character Seto created for his VR world, but I actually had the impression that it was the real one. All he says is, "Memories.... Virtual Reality.... I see, Seto Kaiba." That sounds like Seto got the real one and somehow stuck him in there, and he was aware that it was a world based on memories of what happened. If he himself is only a memory made to move around, he would hardly be aware of that, LOL. I will continue to believe that Duel Links is augmented reality, as depicted in the movie, and the real people are just all in there. Joey certainly indicated that he was real and had been plopped in there when he showed up. Tea too.

I think too much about things.... While watching Yami Bakura vs. Yami Marik again, I started pondering again on the shadow left in the Millennium Puzzle. He spoke like he was fully Yami Bakura and knew what was going on, but he was left in there before Battle City ever began. How did he know about the duel? Since he is part of Yami Bakura's spirit, does that mean Yami Bakura is aware of everything he does and thinks? Or did he not know of the shadow's adventures until they merged at the beginning of season 5? It's always confusing to me when characters in media can split off pieces of their spirit, because of that perplexity. Is it the whole person, as far as personality and memories go, or is it only a part? Was Yami Bakura with Bakura in the Shadow Realm while the other part of him was in the Puzzle? I write it as such. And I got a weird plunnie of him running across a part of his spirit he'd left somewhere and forgotten about, and what would happen if that part didn't want to be good and they had to face off. Weird stuff, but the whole concept of splitting off parts of your spirit is weird anyway, so it lends itself to weird ideas.

I also got an idea for another hurt/comfort picture and I finally had the chance to sketch it out tonight. It came out mostly exactly as I'd pictured in my mind. It has Bakura embracing an extremely limp Yami Bakura around the upper torso and burying his face in the thief's shoulder while crying. Yami Bakura is in his classic form. His head and neck are falling backwards, his visible arm is very limp, and it's all in all a rather curious pose. It's hard to really describe it. One reason I like hurt/comfort art (besides the obvious reason of exploring feelings and interaction) is that it allows me to practice drawing all sorts of strange poses.

Last night I was watching Cannon, an episode where he investigates a girl's death from doping up on drugs and then falling out a window, and got a plunnie where Yami Bakura finds Bakura at a schoolmate's house, completely drunk from being tricked into drinking spiked drinks and swinging in a window in his underwear. Yami Bakura is horrified and outraged. Bakura falls and Yami Bakura catches him, and then he enacts punishment on the creeps responsible for getting Bakura into such a state. He makes them feel the hangover Bakura will feel and also have the sensation of falling over and over. It's not a permanent spell, but he says it will last until they regret what they did to Bakura. Even when Yami Bakura tries to be good, he can end up acting like Yami Yugi in the Toei anime and the early manga volumes. And he doesn't see anything wrong with that. He feels he's enacting justice. Makes sense to me, since what he wanted in ancient Egypt was justice, before Zorc got hold of him and warped him the rest of the way. He will probably always have that dark streak; that's one way I keep him quite the character! I have the first draft of the ficlet written and I quite like it. I need to re-read it and see if it's done. I also need to get the next chapter of the multi-chapter finished. I'm having a little trouble with this segment and am getting easily distracted. Hence why I'm writing epistle entries instead of working on it!