This Is The One Thing I Hope The Devs Of Subnautica Never Ever Ever Change

This is the one thing I hope the devs of Subnautica never ever ever change

Getting around finally to my rewatch of Tak: The Hideous New Girl, and something’s snagged a wrinkle in my head.

When I was younger, I really could not understand what was up with the first half or so of Tak’s introduction, and I honestly chalked up that entire “dating” montage between her and Zim as filler to pad a few laughs and minutes over until the big reveal. Like, she already had about all of the preparations together that she needed to get started on her revenge planet-stuffing plot.

She’d even been on Earth for a good while already, setting up and maintaining that weenie stand front, gathering resources, investing in a solid disguise, etc. if all she needed to do left was get Zim out of the way, and she had managed to track him down… I didn’t see the sense it made in her going the extra mile to enroll in the Skool rather than confront him at his base directly. I especially did not see the sense in her stalling her big master plan in order or read poetry or blow off an entire day humoring his deluded assumptions.

Well, I literally just realized- She had never actually met Zim face to face before the events of this episode. And the guy himself is probably something of a terrifying legend to the rest of his kind, for the context of his mission and banishment. This is the pipsqueak who single handedly ruined Operation Impending Doom I’s take off and recklessly massacred the previous batch of elite Invaders in the process. Said pipsqueak was also capable of knocking half the entire power grid of a planet out over some fun dip, had the balls to reject his own banishment, and still successfully convinced the Tallest somehow to return his job title.

Tak would obviously be aware of every bit of this. That’s why she went to the Skool first, and not alone straight into the lair of the most destructive and unpredictable Irken to currently exist. She was sizing up her opponent on neutral grounds, where neither of them would be able to break into an all-out, cover blowing fight yet.

The poem she read was as thinly veiled a threat/challenge as she could pass off in front of humans, but Zim was still supposed to get the intended message… if only he did not miss the painfully obvious reference to the Armada’s logo she made a part of her disguise.

And the next immediate thing she’s caught doing after pelting Zim with a set of bbq ribs?

I can vividly imagine how easy the lead up to that conversation probably was, too. Dib’s desperately liable to spill everything to the first soul that seems remotely interested in a single word he has to say when it comes to Zim. So, between that and Zim reacting to her first blow so obliviously, she already learned everything she needed to know- mostly, what an absolute fucking joke her potential rival turned out to be. From there really, it looks like it turned into a game of screwing around with him while she still had time to kill- maybe just out of amused curiosity to see how long Zim would try to keep the valentines antics up, maybe just for the sick kicks of inflicting more petty cruelty on him,

Maybe a little mix of both, actually.

God for all its greatness, Origins REALLY undersells the potential trauma of the Broken Circle events on any Surana/Amell that was not being played as a wannabe bloodmage super villain.

Even if your mage HoF had a negative view of the circle, all the way to a seething hatred for the Templars and some of the enchanters… Irving is not just a professor or mentor to you. He was your parent in a setting where you were taken in and completely raised in and by fellow mages, all living under the same rules and oppression and alienation from the outside world together. You spent the majority of your whole life with these people. You probably know the names of almost every apprentice around your age at this point. You slept communally, probably ate communally, filled your free time with games or class activities with them, between training up the one skill your entire life was warped around and banging your head against a wall in boredom, likely.

Like, the Jowan thing is bad enough. Whatever the outcome of his escape attempt was, that’s a bond completely thrown asunder and changed forever with someone they knew as a brother. Implied to be the person closest to them since childhood.

Then they barely have a matter of weeks to months to adjust to that (and the whole blight thing every other HoF also does), and then they come back home at one point knowing they can count on that community for a line of support they could really use right now and what the hell do they find?

All of them- the only people they ever still would have been able to call family or friends before joining the Grey- slaughtered, turned abomination, or about to be one of those two while the Templars that claimed to be protecting them your whole life stood by and refused to help. In fact, the first thing you probably end up doing when you show up is having to negotiate/bicker with Gregoir because he’s openly admitting to sending for the Rite of Annulment in order to doom any survivors as well.

Like, I really really don’t know how to communicate how unbalanced I feel like the significance was put here when I remember how much room the game gave Cousland to be feeling it. To argue and demand with the party after Ostagar that they should keep searching the woods for Fergus. To be belligerent and seething with barely contained disgust and loathing every single time they’re in the same room as Howe.

And what Cousland goes through is awful, truly. But Surana/Amell had to watch literal eldritch horrors from another plane spill through and coat the insides of the tower with writhing flesh and blood. They had to see the broken bodies of templars and twisted faces of arcane horrors that very well could have been a good acquaintance or teacher of theirs. They had to see Cullen tortured and rendered so blinded with hate and pain that he would wish every remaining mage alive in the tower killed. If the boss fight with Uldred goes badly enough, they possibly even have to lose Irving in that confrontation, and in a very not pretty way.

And then like… they just gotta move on to the next major story beat… like that. And like, barely if ever really bring any of it up again in a meaningful sense if at all???

the thing that breaks my heart abt the circle origin is that there IS community there

me: i don’t want to see jellyfish so i will blacklist the tag #jellyfish

people with no common sense: je11yf1sh, je11¥fi5h, j*llyf*sh, je//ÿf!sh, j3ï||yf¡sh, gel lee fisk

result: cannot account for the sheer amount of possible ways to alter the word jellyfish

conclusion: i have to see jellyfish now.

Once again, tumblr is not tiktok, tag properly.

I think society started to collapse about the time when we stopped having inexplicably creepy kid's cartoons. Can you think of a single good thing that's happened in the English-speaking world since the Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack ended

Out of all small mammals that have been domesticated as pets, hamsters are one of the most interesting varieties.

And when I say interesting, I mean because they’re so unique, and there is a lot of complexity to them that often goes overlooked even by the owners taking care of them. Naturally, they aren’t well understood by most people, and it’s a strange kind of scary how that misunderstanding can lead to a lot of pain and tragedy for both keeper and pet.

Out of everything there is to know, the most distinct thing about hamsters is probably how downright antisocial they are to other small animals.

When you take a look at other household rodents, you usually see incredibly social creatures which can actually suffer when kept alone. So much so that there are countries outlawing the keeping of single guinea pigs, under the scope of broad animal cruelty regulations.

Take rats, or mice, for another example. Very common subjects of study and experimentation, and renowned for their ability to form bonds and bustling communities.

It’s common knowledge to any rat or mouse owner worth their salt that these animals thrive best when kept in the company of their own, and they naturally prefer to live in groupings.

Your average hamster? Not so at all. In fact, the majority of hamster breeds harbor so much potential for aggression with their own that the previous husbandry advice goes completely out the window when caring for them. And all of this goes extra for anyone with a Syrian hamster on their hands.

The absolute largest of domestic breeds, Syrian hamsters (also referred to as golden hamsters) are an exemplary variety for demonstrating this point. Make any remote suggestion of cohabbing two of these and forums and experts alike will be quick to tell you stop, do not pass “Go”, do not collect $200, because failing to consider the risks might end well… gruesomely.

Some people get the wrong impression that two Syrian hamsters can share a space because, well, they see that pet shops are getting away with housing juveniles together for a time.

It is true that when they are still young and developing, they will tolerate cage-mates much easier, and it’s been shown that you have the best chances when pairing some hamsters with a same-sex sibling they have been raised together with.

Despite however swimmingly this situation seems to be going for now, it is ultimately not so sustainable in the long run. For see… Syrian hamsters eventually mature into highly territorial, solitary creatures by their nature.

Inevitably, that nature will bleed through, creating tensions of dominance struggle between the two that could escalate into more violent fighting.

And as some former pet owners can anecdotally attest to, these fights can and occasionally do end in serious injury for one or both of the animals. Often enough, the victor will turn to cannibalistic actions as well, killing (and eating) its cage-mate in the worst case scenario.

And what of those who are still surviving, and maybe even adapting to the presence of another hamster? Interestingly, when one of the Syrians doesn’t end up devouring the other, these lower stakes conflicts have a stark impact on the psychology and behavior of both combatants involved. After a fight is concluded for Syrian hamsters, something of a pecking order between the two begins to form when the loser cannot get away, where the winner actually adjusts to become more aggressive and dominant over the shared territory. Studies have shown that the hamster at the short end of the stick can start to lose its own willingness to behave dominantly following a hard social defeat. After repeated abuse of this fashion from a cage-mate, the submissive will become more docile and appeasing to the dominant partner over time- a phenomenon known as “conditioned defeat” which appears similar to a kind of learned helplessness.

All in all, the social inclinations of golden hamsters with same-species companions are, at best, quite unpredictable, but in a morbidly fascinating way, me thinks. End of the day, there’s still just something both extremely entertaining and endearing about them, and their quirks.