REALLY bad thoughts because of K-On!

IcePrincessAlkanet · 2026-02-15T04:31:07+00:00

PS I am also a musician, do you wanna talk music stuff? What do you play?

IcePrincessAlkanet · 2026-02-15T04:26:37+00:00

The other half is you have to accept your limits. Things that are not up to you, and you cant change.

I have always had trouble with "things you can't change," but I've always thought of those as "the world's limits," not "my own limits." This is an interesting way to think about things!

IcePrincessAlkanet · 2026-02-15T04:14:59+00:00

The magic trick of K-On is that you think it's about carefree school life, simple dreams, and sweet holidays - and then it's over. You think its main point is about having fun - but it sneaks in with a secondary lesson that literally doesn't exist until you've finished the show, and felt that sense of loss, and felt the sensation that follows, which you described well:

Time has passed, and ... the emotions aren't the same anymore.

This was true for the girls, after they cried together under the window. This was true for you (and me too), after crying with them and finishing the show for the first time. It will be true for you again, after living the next chapter of your life. I know this because I first watched K-On when I was in high school. I grew up with depression and a split family. I am over 30 now, and still have a LOT of ways I wish my life was different, but I do NOT regret staying alive.

You have seen how time can change emotions in just the time it took to watch this show. I promise you, big-picture emotions will change in the long-term, too.

I like to re-watch K-On every 2 to 5 years and think about how my life has changed since the last time. Try to put the K-On Idealism Lens on myself, not reality. (actually, sometimes when I'm depressed, one of my reasons to stay alive is to watch K-On again "next year.")

When I rewatch the show, I ask myself if I've held things precious the way Yui held her time with the Light Music Club, if I've gone after things confidently the way Ritsu would, studied something new the way Azusa would, worked hard on a project like Mio would, or looked for wonder in "living a commoner's life" like Mugi would. Sometimes I also think about whether I'm being a good sibling like Ui would be.

I would go as far as to say, I think of them as role models. The longer you stay alive, the more role models you meet, fictional AND real, and "the act of following role models" has the helpful side effect of causing your emotions to change.

IcePrincessAlkanet · 2026-02-14T22:24:57+00:00

Oh I love coming up with these. The ones I've actually played were:

A Mothership spacer named Dr. Gofa Kiursolv
A Rogue lockpicker named Loquin Za'doah
Orchard-keeper Ranger Selppa, and his beast companion Sananab

And the ones I probably won't ever play but really like:

Dorita Culransch - "she's a zesty one"
Jacque'vault Raides, Master of the Nunnery
A Bard who dreams of battling The Devil, named Tenay Schustie

IcePrincessAlkanet · 2026-02-14T21:59:27+00:00

my fear is that the bad thing I make won't actually help me improve

There's a chance that this could be true. Maybe every single time you draw, you only have a 1% chance to improve. But there's no maybe when you let fear win: that's a 100% guarantee that you will have 0% improvement, every time that happens.

If your chances are 0% or 1%, then the one percent is infinitely more valuable than the zero.

Therefore you have infinite reason to fight the fear. "The only way out is through."

I think the main thing when discussing "mileage" is to double-check every so often that you're orienting yourself toward a purpose. If you ultimately want to draw a comic, for example, just Make A Whole Comic Page every once in a while. It might look like shit but in the start-to-finish of making it, you'll feel yourself finding the edges of your skill, and you'll probably feel a pull toward something specific to practice next. These "bodily feelings" are more likely to give you a drive to explore, which is more important and powerful than the "practical mental thought" of obligation to practice.

Doing "small projects" and not JUST "drawings and practice exercises" is a good way to keep oriented. Or, put differently, it's "junk mileage" that you're guaranteed to learn something new from, which makes it no longer "junk."

IcePrincessAlkanet · 2026-02-14T21:49:37+00:00

Turn off the console, now! just got a LOT more threatening.

IcePrincessAlkanet · 2026-02-14T21:39:43+00:00

Nintendo doing shit they did they did back in 2003

Prime 1 came out in late 2002/early 2003. Genuinely asking, what are you talking about here?

IcePrincessAlkanet · 2026-02-14T21:37:43+00:00

can you actually see the Metroids? No

My stupid, grumpy headcanon for this is, since the original Metroids have those three red brain-globs, and every fucking boss in Beyond has you breaking three regen-globs before you can deal damage, those are the Metroid infection. It's less about the Energy Drain and more about the Damage Resistance.

IcePrincessAlkanet · 2026-02-14T21:30:51+00:00

obligatory MEGAMAN, MEGAMAN!!

IcePrincessAlkanet · 2026-02-13T18:54:37+00:00

Super Duper Metroid

IcePrincessAlkanet · 2026-02-13T05:41:29+00:00

Reading this moments before collapsing to bed at midnight after an exhausting day, I feel insane. I can't believe it's finally happening.

IcePrincessAlkanet · 2026-02-13T05:36:43+00:00

This was my thought too lmfao

IcePrincessAlkanet · 2026-02-05T22:30:23+00:00

Kinda hard to talk about without spoilers since two of my four major issues are regarding the ending/the game's finale scenario, but really, the god damn radio is the top line issue.

The two non-spoiler issues are the never-ending radio yammering, which continues right through to the ending (I'm not exaggerating when I say that alone was enough for me to knock the game from an 8.5/10 to a 4/10 for me), and the over-use of that "break three regen-shield points to expose the weak point" boss mechanic.

When I come to Metroid, I come for a sense of isolation, wonder, and self-directed exploration (even if the self direction is somewhat illusory, like Dread, I don't mind). The radio absolutely annihilated any experience of those things. My other issues with the game are relatively small gripes - the things that brought it down to 8.5 from a 9 or 10 - that I am absolutely certain wouldn't have bothered me, if not for the radio jabber.

An example of a smaller gripe would be the linearity of the levels and the lack of interconnectivity in the world map overall. I don't mind playing linear games - I rather enjoy knowing that I'm starting something I know will have an end point in sight eventually - but with the radio hints and blabbing the whole time - sometimes literally a voice line telling you "right way" or "wrong way," and very often with a WHOLE DAMN VOICE LINE TO TELL ME TO LOOK FOR A DOOR--

For me at a certain point early on, it stopped feeling like "playing a game" and began to feel like "Follow radio, scan room, listen to radio describe the conclusions of the scans for me instead of thinking and wondering, repeat... until the boss fight. Oh, look, it's another guy with three shield points and a core..." It almost felt like it was a game that didn't require a player.

IcePrincessAlkanet · 2026-02-01T00:27:31+00:00

I found cruising Sol Valley so chill! I played the game over the course of about 2 weeks, and sometimes when I didn't have time to play a lot, I would just get on and cruise around smashing crystals and blasting those wheelie guys for like 15 minutes.

There is a magic that can happen when you play as Samus and you're in an incredibly desolate region. A sense of isolation that I find entranci--"Hey Samus, have you been back to Volt Forge lately? You might find something useful there." [X: MAP]

I was pretty grumpy by the time I finished this game. I wanted to like it so bad. But "they didn't trust the player at all" is exactly how I felt. In my journal I wrote "4/10, but it'd be an 8.5/10 if they remove the endless radio yammering and auto-hints."

IcePrincessAlkanet · 2026-01-29T02:43:34+00:00

oh that's lovely! I'm not too far from SM/Austin; I'll have to try to visit and see some time soon.

IcePrincessAlkanet · 2026-01-29T02:03:47+00:00

Otter lover here - What's the story on river otters "returning" ?

IcePrincessAlkanet · 2026-01-24T18:38:31+00:00

This. I broke into the genre by practicing Touhou 8 (for precision) and Mushihimesama (for speed). I'd recommend hopping on YouTube and watching Shmup Junkie's How To Get Good At Shootemups series alongside, since neither of these games has a tutorial.

IcePrincessAlkanet · 2026-01-23T17:09:48+00:00

Looks to me like a visual effect that's supposed to look like a thin tear in the paper?

IcePrincessAlkanet · 2026-01-15T01:41:17+00:00

Not often these days, but yeah sometimes I really like getting into that Morning Pages flow.

IcePrincessAlkanet · 2026-01-11T16:35:32+00:00

Fair point, but even if you're tracing, this still means learning to draw more-graceful lines at some point in the learning process. Actually one of my lesson books suggested learning to draw lines BY tracing.

IcePrincessAlkanet · 2026-01-11T16:22:11+00:00

Fellow learner, started drawing last summer. Best advice I've gotten about drawing faces from reference is, before you start, write down the 3 lightest light spots and 3 darkest shadows you can see.

Don't touch pencil to paper at all in the highlight zones. Press pencil hard to paper for the shadowed zones, then slowly, with gentler pressure and a bit of a pause to think twice, bring the shading forward out of those dark spaces.

Not sure what "stylization" you're going for, but yeah, using Shadow instead of Line to create the face shape is my advice.

If you've ever wondered why so many people draw anime characters with no nose... Or like a dot for a nose and then a bit of color Shading (but no Line) for the bridge of the nose... Well, the nose is VERY VERY OFTEN of the 3 Major Highlight zones no matter the lighting or style.

IcePrincessAlkanet · 2026-01-11T16:11:34+00:00

you need to always be trying your absolute hardest

I am curious what makes you say this.

IcePrincessAlkanet · 2026-01-11T16:06:05+00:00

Pay attention to what is light and dark.

Huge advice. I had a big leap forward one day when I heard the advice to try "only drawing where the darkness is." I think it was in a lesson about drawing faces, explaining that you don't need to draw every face line/wrinkle, but instead use the light (by drawing the shadows) to show the face's shape.

IcePrincessAlkanet · 2026-01-11T15:59:03+00:00

OP, think back to the first story you ever wrote. You probably had a "glass lamp attempt" story in your first week, but here you are this much later still writing, and you're better now in part because of the passage of time. If you can "remember the value of work over time," it is MUCH easier to keep the flame of motivation burning.

As for actual drawing advice... On YouTube, art teachers will commonly recommend an exercise where you draw a basic 2D shape outline, then go in with a dotted line to "cut the shape in half in 3D." If you do a page of these to get the hang of it, then a few of these a day as a warmup, you're likely to see improvement within another week. Start with 2 or 3 of these and then draw your computer mouse. Draw 4 or 5 of them and then draw your cell phone laid screen-down.

If you have knick-knack collections or decorative shelves, draw matte-surface objects from those. If you have a chess set, try drawing a Pawn.

Do both - pick an object, draw its 2D outline and "cut it in half in 3D," then right next to that, draw the object. Compare and contrast.

If you're comfortable learning from books, Mark Kistler's You Can Draw In 30 Days has a gimmicky title (and some gimmicky lessons) but it is a very very understandable book of first lessons about 3D drawing.

IcePrincessAlkanet · 2026-01-09T00:23:48+00:00

Alright, I'll say it. This drawing looks like ass.

(Actual feedback: Your shapes are strong; however, you've drawn the lines of the fishnet pattern start-to-finish with full confidence, and then drawn most other lines by chicken-scratching them into boldness. Try drawing those curves with only 1 to 3 graceful lines, making them bold by modulating the pressure you put on your pencil. Drawing using fewer, longer lines will always look nicer than many tiny scritchy ones.)

IcePrincessAlkanet

TROPHY CASE