the well #89 - Adeleine's Maximum Fun Chamber

[Adeleine]

"A stranger is being shown around a village that he has just become part of. He is shown a well and his guide says "On any day except Tuesday, you can shout any question down that well and you'll be told the answer." The man seems pretty impressed, and so he shouts down, "Why not on Tuesday?" A voice from in the well shouts back, "Because on Tuesday, it's your day in the well."

Hello brutal, vicious, cunning interrogators, casual observers, and sousaphone players! While I eagerly await being purged on obviously false charges – created not to be believed, but to convey Smogoff's iron fist through their absurdity – allow me to introduce myself. To pretend to ensure my safety, the Commission has requested I not present some personal details of my offline persona. Nevertheless, they've carefully curated my messages to provide you ample opportunity to impeach my credibility.

If you don't know already, I'm Adeleine, your everyday intellectual trans girl with a shitposting streak. You can call me Ado if you like. My site history is longer than some users' lifespans, and I have the name changes to match. I'll roughly break that into eras.

rp2865 / TheTiksiBranch / Tiksi
I first joined Showdown as rp2865 in 2013. That name actually comes from my account on Sporcle, the quiz game site. My quiz "Ultimate Pokemon Move Blitz Minefield" had 16,000 plays, and my "Arceus or Magikarp" quiz got a Curator's Pick. Before Showdown, my biggest online presence was on the Muthead Madden forums for Madden Mobile. My best memory there is running an investment fund with forum members where I bought a bunch of card packs and solid their contents for a profit.

As for Showdown itself, I was first a regular in the Trivia room, eventually becoming an owner + global voice there and its Question Workshop subroom, making questions for official room games. I branched out into many other rooms, eventually becoming global staff, focused on user support (being the closest thing to a Help Room Owner before that position existed) and policy. At one point or another, I've been auth in 11 rooms. In rough order of my joining:

Trivia, Help, Lobby, Game Corner, Mafia, Wi-Fi, Anything Goes, Pokemon Games, Random Battles, Smash Bros., Video Games

This was when I actually played the game of Pokemon semi-seriously. I was a solid Anything Goes player, chipping into tier discussion and doing well on the ladder. The one tournament I joined, I lost in the first round... while taking the only game in the whole tournament from the eventual winner.

Finland
After stepping back from the site for a while, I came back with a new name and a new interest in getting work done. I was voracious in room and global policy, and I fiended global staff help tickets for a while. While I still played some randomized formats casually, what I loved most was working on Random Battle formats. I co-led the creation of 3 randomized formats – Gen 3 Random Battle, Gen 4 Random Battle, and Gen 8 Battle Factory – while chipping in heavily to the base Random Battles of the generations at the time, as well as Super Staff Bros. Brawl.

I got a lot more active in Smogon, too. Previously, I cared little for Smogon besides discussion specifically about Pokemon Showdown, or maybe Anything Goes and some periodic Pet Mods activity. As Finland, I got involved in the social forums and the Discord. I also became a GP (Grammar / Prose) checker for site content, checking about 1300 articles and 200 pieces of other content.

Adeleine
After another step back and another step forward, I bloomed into my current form. As an old user, I settled in my haunts (Lobby / Smash Bros. / Video Games on PS, Discord social channels, Smogoff). After a lot of years, I've gotten more comfortable just being myself in these spaces, being less "plugged in" and work-focused. I've increasingly put myself out there with thoughtful content analyzing and opining on various things, which my signature links to some of.

This is also the point where, probably, I'm done playing the official Pokemon games indefinitely. Hooray? I liked Shield, my last game, but felt the franchise's sameyness grating on me, feeling no need to buy more. My negative reactions to various parts of new content, like the new Mega Evolutions, is making that vague detachment settle in more concretely. I've been playing less video games in general, honestly. Part of my getting older process.

My nicknames of Adeleine and Ado come from the Kirby artists – their similarities to the Celeste lady and Japanese singer are neat but coincidental.

Gaming Outside of PS / Smogon
My first Pokemon game was HeartGold. I did and do find it pretty middling. X was next, which I liked quite a bit. Moon was probably the highest quality of games I've completed, but X stuck with me more personally. Shield can sit in the middle of X and Moon there. I've also played varying pieces of other Pokemon games, from Stadium to Emerald to Diamond to New Pokemon Snap.

I've always been a Nintendo gamer, with the Wii as my first console. Now, my biggest game is Smash Bros. Ultimate, which I'm pretty dang good at, enough to usually go positive in competitive local tournaments. Alongside Smash, I tend to fiend a game or two at a time, moving onto the next game when I'm spent. Some recent hits have been Pikmin 1, Spelunky 2, and Luck be a Landlord (the inspiration for Balatro).

Though my current genre of interest may be called "arcade", I historically showed a conspicuous aversion to prioritizing any one genre. Some of my historical favorites, games that meant a lot for my perspective on gaming, art, and even myself are: Super Mario Galaxy, Pikmin 1, Kirby 64, Fire Emblem: Three Houses, Kid Icarus: Uprising, and Persona Q2. The first two are the only games I've played and rate 9.5/10. Some lesser-known hits that mean a lot to me are Mario Super Sluggers, Ancient Domains of Mystery (ADOM), Petz Dogz: 2, Frogger: He's Back, and The Incredible Machine. Also here are some computer / Flash games of my childhood: Webkinz, Carbon Combat, Snailiad, Steambirds(: Survival), Antbuster, Pirate Defense, and The Incredible Machine.

I love watching games that I don't quite have the time or means to play, and have gotten very invested in some of their stories, characters, and energy. Mother, Undertale Yellow, TS!Underswap, Star Fox 64, and Yume Nikki come to mind. In general, I like games that create compelling worlds through artistry in presentation and subtle worldbuilding, games with short compelling mechanical loops, or games that present long-term time investments to accumulate resources and/or avoid permanent loss. I also love collecting fanart from games and have massive caches for my favorite characters.

Life Outside of Gaming
The Commission has limited the information I provide here, but they found these details acceptable to include.

I am in my 20s and live in the United States. I'm interested in many social / soft sciences and disciplines, including history, geography, politics, psychology, sociology, and interpreting art. For media besides games, I like watching movies from time to time, and have long-running interests in some webcomics: 8-Bit Theater, Order of the Stick, and Dumbing of Age. People mostly know me for being smart, nice, a serious-minded Discusser of Things, teasing and annoying my friends for fun, and full of eccentric tastes, preferences, and opinions. When I say I love nature and animals, that can include your national parks and your adorable kitties, but I'm also enamored with spiders, and bugs in general. I'm somewhere on the spectrum of being a furry, mostly when it comes to bugs. I've got a huge sweet tooth, with a predilection for mint and coconut. My family has been and is full of adorable pets, including a cat (I'm closest with her), a dog, two guinea pigs, a rabbit, and five hamsters. If I were to get a pet myself, it'd either be ferrets or a spider.

I can't wait to answer your questions with more detail than necessary, further facilitating my eventual purging!

 

[phoopes]

Finland

After another step back and another step forward, I bloomed into my current form.

Would you say you're Finnished?

 

[Adeleine]

Would you say you're Finnished?

No, but now you will be

This reminds me of all the times people asked if I was Finnish when I had the name Finland

That was a disadvantage I hadn't thought about prior to taking the name

It made perfect sense for them to ask (unless they are named CaffeineBoost..........) but it was a bit repetitive and awkward over time, particularly because I'm not

 

[CaffeineBoost]

Are you Finnish?

 

[nya]

Top 6.5 Webkinz games?

 

[Let's go shuckles]

Are you familiar with the concept of finlandization?

 

[chroma_2903]

have you ever had a dream that um that um you could um

 

[Magic Mayhem Maiden]

I really enjoy your analysis on various topics, especially the character and game designs. What would you say is your main things you look out for when analyzing these?

Also, is there a cool review of yours you would like to highlight?

Extra Question:
Choose one: Red/Fire, Blue/Water, Green/Wood, White/Light, Black/Dark.

 

[shadowpea]

opinion on pineapple on pizza

 

[mysticmarshtomp]

why finland

 

[RainWaiv]

Thoughts on non-platform fighting games (Street fighter, tekken, blazblue, etc.)
since you play smash bros apparently the question seemed appropriate

also; thoughts on the indie band "mili" run by singer-songwriter cassie wei and producer yamato kasai?

 

[a fairy]

what question do you hope you get asked this well
what is the answer to that question

what is your icebreaker
whats your proudest achievement

 

[Bog Monster]

Do you have a favorite rock?

 

[solrock the great]

if you had to pick a superpower, what would it be?

 

[adjectivenoun]

It was a great honor to nominate my eternal companion in football posting and an even greater honor to see you crush the voting process. I have a baker's half-dozen of questions for you:

1. What's your favorite book?
2. If you had to root for an NFL team other than the Green Bay Packers, which one would you pick, and why?
3. What's your favorite species of beetle?
4. What kinds of music do you like to listen to?
5. If you regularly operate a motor vehicle, what is your preferred speed on roads where the speed limit is 55 miles per hour?
6. What are your favorite and least favorite aspects of forum culture?
7. What was the best question you ever made for the Trivia room?

 

[BestDatrix]

are you a page 53 enjoyer by any chance?

 

[Adeleine]

Top 6.5 Webkinz games?

I'm so glad for the excuse to talk about Webkinz games! My favorite parts of Webkinz were the games, collecting items, and making themed rooms, all of which kind of intertwined, so I have a lot to talk about.

What I consider my "signature game" was Zacky's Quest. I really loved the energy of Zacky's Quest, how precarious it felt with so many traps and enemies visible to you at once (in general a strength of Webkinz games to me), how small it made me feel in these big worlds with these big enemies, and the wonder of actually managing to pull off the laborious effort of finishing the whole game, and earning that trophy, especially in an era where trophies were rare.

Second is actually Wishing Well 2. It's at its core non-interactive, but it does a really good job at the little things of a game like that to me, with the multiple periods, good distribution of prize payouts, and nice vibes. Third is Dex Dangerous and the Lunar Lugbots. It was at a really good difficulty point for me that it felt hard and intense while still allowing me to do well, and I liked the design of the Lugbots quite a bit, finding them a bit otherwordly and scary. Fourth is Quizzy's Word Challenge. It was a great match for my intellectual disposition – I also liked Quizzy's Corner quite a bit too.

Here it gets more challenging. I'll take your non-whole number qualifier as an excuse to talk about a bunch of games that might make this list, which you can give 2.5 credit too. First are Lunch Letters and Wacky's Bullseye Batter, which really hit a mechanical sweetspot for me with their simple, replicable, skill-based gameplay. Especially Lunch Letters, with a skill of typing that I genuinely like and am good at. At times, this was my best Kinzcash game. Second are what I call "the old games." I joined Webkinz late enough that these were not the only games available, and I don't know the specific times of addition to be sure these are the oldest, but they have a shared theme of a particular "old Webkinz" simpler aesthetic, and a very simple but effective gameplay loop that usually escalates with speed. I find them quite charming – even if I didn't always play them, I'm happy they were there and on the Arcade game list, and I did play them occasionally. These are Tulip Trouble, Go Go Googles (not quite as cogent with the category, but oh well. I actually had a Google), Pumpkin Patch Protector, and Lily Padz. (There are others here, like Goober's Lab, but I didn't like them as much.) Lastly is Wheel of Wow, for similar reasons as Wishing Well 2, but not succeeding quite as much. I was generally quite fond of dailies.

Are you familiar with the concept of finlandization?

Yes! It is funny that my name was also kind of a verb.

have you ever had a dream that um that um you could um

Well I um I um I

 

[Adeleine]

I really enjoy your analysis on various topics, especially the character and game designs. What would you say is your main things you look out for when analyzing these?

Good question! My first thought is message. My primary lens for viewing art is as communication, as communicating impactful messages in creative and skilled ways that allow the message to penetrate further into our mindspace than pure text. If I were to abstract out my evaluative process, it goes something like this, albeit not this rigid. What are the main messages the piece is conveying to us? -> Are these messages worthy of praise? (Here I don't primarily mean "moral correctness" – although that can factor in of course. I mean more "is it compelling," which I understand is the kind of vagueness that invites further questions.) -> Are these messages told well in a storytelling sense? -> Are there other messages or pieces that undermine these main messages?

It's worth taking a shot to better answer that "compelling" question, especially since it permeates many steps of the process. All art has messaging – how do I separate the wheat from the chaff? Another frame here is the "lorehead question": why am I often (not always) dismissive of lore in games, which (correctly) implies I often little value its messages and storytelling thereof? Another frame is this one: what is the deep (possible) difference between art I enjoy and art that I think is good?

These questions are hard to answer. They're in a way the soul of evaluation and of criticism, and many people more expert than I have tackled them with no conclusive result. My answers are also built from complex, winding years of sharpening my critical perspective, and not from first principles. However, it's worth taking a shot at formulating my answers in specific terms. Here goes.

To me, whether art is good boils down to one primary question. Does it have an honest relationship with depth? To communicate my understanding of depth, first take any class physical object, like apples. If I wanted to describe to you what apples are, there are many physical traits I could reference, like expectations (which could vary for specific specimens) on height, length, width, color, location, etc. These physical traits are one way to think about "What is an apple?" (This way is the approach that lore tends to take.) This approach is not what I mean by depth. You could perfectly catalog on apple in every physical dimension and still be completely lacking in depth. Why?

Because depth entails asking "So what?" Why do all these objective data points matter? It's one thing to say they exist, and I could accurately describe apples in terms of % of carbon atoms, but we both would find that a rather unhelpful descriptor. What descriptors matter, and how do we figure out that subjective question? To do that, we must create the apple. Not physically creating a physical fruit, but building up in our brains the idea of an apple, and deciding what components comprise that concept. What components are most meaningful to it, what components matter most to it, and why. By working in this dimension of meaning, with a heart that genuinely strives (more) to learn, and (more) not to pursue other ends like ego and wealth, we create depth. There's no one correct answer to questions in the dimension of meaning, like there are for physical questions, but we don't need to find a one correct answer. What we should strive for is to strive, to find better answers that (to our understanding) create more and more solid meaning.

Let me touch on the "honest relationship" part. Art does not need to spend hours and days and weeks building up understanding in the dimension of meaning to be good to me. What I desire most fundamentally from art and artists is not a set amount of work hours. What I want is for people to strive to strive for meaning, for people to generally try and care about meaning (and by extension about art), and to have reasonably accurate understandings of their understanding of meaning (to not be pretentious). As far as reasonability, my standards change a lot on context. I would expect a 7 year old to be weaker in these areas than a multimillionaire prestigious film director, because these two individuals have had different opportunities to grow in art.

Also, is there a cool review of yours you would like to highlight?

(I'm going to answer this in a way that is also helpful for people who haven't seen the Ado-logue, so some information may already be obvious to you.)

The Ado-logue in my signature contains my featured analytical content. It has a specific "Featured" section that contains my favorite works. There I have my (partial) XY, Super Paper Mario, and Kirby 64 reviews, which I'm especially fond of. There's also other partial reviews in there that I like, like on BW, modern Kirby, Transformers: One, and a ton of scattered Smash Bros. Ultimate and Pokemon content. I've thought about full reviews but have generally found the format to not match my review desires and strengths, which benefit from isolating out specific things I find especially important. If you're asking if I have any cool content outside the Ado-logue to note here, unfortunately not. Smogon has really been my one outlet for this kind of material, and outlet I am thankful for. Lots of scattered content has taken place in PS or Discord chatrooms, but I unfortunately don't have any ability to find and pool such content here.

Extra Question:
Choose one: Red/Fire, Blue/Water, Green/Wood, White/Light, Black/Dark.

This is a fascinating question for me because I have a deep and intricate web of "color relationships" tying them to ideas, emotions, and values. Some of these align with the standard for Western culture, like Blue and Water. Others are less clear fits. Lightning and Electricity are Orange for me, not Yellow. Blue is Water, but it's also Starpower. Red is associated with Fire, but Pink is more so. Black is Dark for me, but my Black/White oppositionality is not so much a Light/Dark oppositionality – I use Yellow more for Light than White.

The colors I associate myself with most, "my (stronger) colors," are Orange (individuality, lightning, electricity, energy and motivation, engineering and mechanisms, science, extraversion) and Green (art, creativity, passion, growth, peace, rest, compassion, kindness, openness of heart, moderate storms), While I don't associate Green with nature or plants holistically – that would more be Pink, and other colors play in some too – Green does have particular association with forests, fruits, and (partially) flowers. Green/Wood is the natural pick for me, especially because its plant associations align with how I view growth here. All of them have some potential applications – under certain interpretations of Light, White/Light probably comes second. As a sort of video game character interaction with these archetypes, I'd likely be into healing and potentially holy magic. Red/Fire is probably the weakest.

 

[Adeleine]

opinion on pineapple on pizza

This isn't for the bit – I've taken the time to think about this in the past, and it has actually made me physically a bit nauseous. I have very particular relationships with food, and, while I have no desire to dunk on people who enjoy this or frame it as "bad food", this combination is anathema to my pre-existing relationships.

why finland

I've long an interest in the history, geography, and politics of Eastern Europe. Finland was and is my favorite country in the region, for lots of reasons. Its very unique political and cultural situations over the past 300 years, the beauty I find in the Finnish language and Finnish music, its remarkable achievement in the Winter War leading up to World War II, and the beauty of its geography and nature are some. I have been to Helsinki for a week trip, spending a day in a national park farther north and another day taking the ferry to Estonia, and Finland is my favorite country I have been in. (Estonia shares a particular cultural relationship with Finland. I quite enjoyed being there as well and would like to go back longer sometime.) In general, my favorite countries are those who have had periods of historical strength, but have generally not been great powers, with very distinct positions in terms of self-conception, culture, language. Georgia, Greece, and Hungary naturally fit in here.

Thoughts on non-platform fighting games (Street fighter, tekken, blazblue, etc.)
since you play smash bros apparently the question seemed appropriate

I've tried several, particularly Persona 4: Arena and Blazblue: Cross Tag, and a bit of Street Fighter 4 too. I played Shadow Naoto in P4A and Naoto, Aigis, Orie, and Vatista in BB Tag. I have a lot of respect for the genre, but it just hasn't clicked with me. With how I experience fighting games, I care a lot about feeling fully in control of my options, and technical skill is my weakest part, so overcoming the entry barrier to immerse myself in a non-Smash fighting game is a particularly weak proposition for me. I quite enjoy content on these games, though, especially Bafael's discussion of Street Fighter on Youtube. Big Yellow is also quite cool too.

also; thoughts on the indie band "mili" run by singer-songwriter cassie wei and producer yamato kasai?

I am unfamiliar with that band. With how I experience music (answering a question on that soon), my unfamiliarity with that music – and much of the music that people would normally ask about – will be unsurprising.

what question do you hope you get asked this well
what is the answer to that question

what is your icebreaker
whats your proudest achievement

Honestly, I just hoped they all wouldn't be shitposts, haha. And indeed they have not been. There's been a lot of interesting and fun questions – thank you all!

This repeats from my introduction, but animals and pets are a natural topic of conversation in these situations, and "I love spiders / would consider getting a pet spider" is my go-to icebreaker. It's fun and weird and says a lot about me.

My proudest achievement is working through a lot of psychological and mental challenges across my life. I'm a bit unusual of a person and have struggled to relate to other people, open myself up to them, and understand and internalize their actions and advice. Like, I have autism, and I still usually have these challenges with other autistic people, too. The total number of people in my life where, being around them felt normal and where the world felt normal, including family, friends, coworkers, supervisors, online and offline, is like, single digits.

These struggles are challenging in their own right, but they don't capture the bigger picture, where, with this reduced frame of reference and guidance, I struggled to understand and open up to myself. That required a lot of work and challenges, and I still want to grow more, but the progress I have undertaken in my life – while still staying on track for my plans on the future of my life – is utterly remarkable. From a kid who required serious professional help to talk (I don't mean "talk without stuttering or a speech impediment", I mean talk) and constant effortful immersion to navigate the physical and social world on something like my own terms, to a young adult who went through hell to construct a warehouse of master-class mental tools to better understand her capabilities and place in the world. I'm a miracle. A miracle who wouldn't be where I am today without tremendous help from lots of people in my life, but also a miracle who took her life and identity in her own two hands to make that possible.

 

[Adeleine]

Do you have a favorite rock?

Good question! I don't have a particular one, but I have some I definitely like. (Edit: While composing this post, I realized there was one, if we count gemstones at least.) I'm going to choose to include gemstones in here, because if you count them as "rocks," they're my favorite type, but I will talk about more traditional rocks too.

My favorite gem is ruby, and I like emerald and sapphire too. A more "basic" answer from me than some might expect! I'm familiar enough with them to see enough examples of their very deep powerful hues, and single well-defined hues are often a way I positively interface with color. (I talk some more about my relationship with color earlier.)

I also like quartz and diamond, but less in terms of beauty and appearance than the gems above. I respect quartz's commonness as a gem and diamond's physical and mechanical properties. I find diamond's (manipulated) scarcity to be cool, but I like the practicality of created diamonds too, especially given the lens I appreciate diamonds here. I like both kinds, probably comparably, but if I were ever to acquire or be given a diamond, I would definitely prefer the created variety, because I'd rather the extreme cost of mined diamond be used towards some other end. In general, when I extremely appreciate a gift, it's due to a type of specific pre-existing mental connection I have with the object of the gift (or what it represents), so a very expensive gift is generally a poor match for my personality type.

For more traditional rock, I like coal and limestone for their applications. Beyond that, I'm not particularly keyed into the type of a rock – I find learning the specific type of a rock an interesting way to learn about it that increases my specific connection to it, but I'm not usually desiring one type of rock over another, though I would find rarer and more valuable rocks more cool in general. I tend to evaluate specific rocks by the specific shapes and patterns, generally valuing those that are unusually smooth and solid-patterned, or those matching a given defined shape, or those particularly pretty or unusual in their patterns. Some way I can connect the rock to some dimension I attach importance to.

if you had to pick a superpower, what would it be?

This is a question I tend to struggle with, because I'm torn between two dimensions of evaluating it: finding what power I can perfectly maximize and optimize to improve my life and priorities, versus what power aligns with my heart in a storytelling sense. I'll pick the second here, because I find it more interesting. Healing, changing my appearance, and teleportation are natural fits here, with powers using imagination to create varying things, or control over element(s), also in consideration.

 

[PHB11677]

Thoughts on Super Bowl XXXII?

 

[Adeleine]

It was a great honor to nominate my eternal companion in football posting and an even greater honor to see you crush the voting process. I have a baker's half-dozen of questions for you:

Honestly I did not think I would win lol. It was a pleasant surprise to see the tallies build up and stay that way! Thanks for the nom :)

What's your favorite book?

I'll approach this question from a couple different angles.

The Silmarillion is my typical answer. For those unaware, it's the foundation upon which The Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit rest. Much has been said about its virtues and I don't wish to be repetitive, but I'll add that a big part of it for me is just, Tolkein's clear care and earnest craft going into the world making it a lot easier for me to trust him and his world, helping me immerse myself into it more deeply.

Epic is a less-known fantasy novel that was the standout book of my younger self, and one I still hold very dear. It takes the question of "What if life was an RPG and you were a teenager in it?" and, instead of just using that for wish fulfillment and hype moments and aura, deconstructs it and follows it through to a surprisingly intricate and thoughtful conclusion. As a child young enough, and incompletely exposed enough, to where the very idea of an RPG video game was magical in its own right, this was an utterly dazzling read, and I still resonate with the thoughtful development it gives its subject matter.

The Ultimate Ponzi: The Scott Rothstein Story is probably the book I've reread the most, and across the longet stretch of time. I love exploring meaning and psychology in the context of evil and crime, and this book has the storytelling, understanding, and real case to delightfully dig into that.

Its classification into "book" is a bit awkward – the author uses "interactive fiction" and I agree with that, and it has some similarities with visual novels – but Le Morte d'Arthur deserves mention either way as my recent favored literary experience. It is free, and you can read more about it and "play?" it here. It serves a function I really value, one somewhat similar to Epic actually, and one that would really parallel what I'd do if I wrote a book. It puts a lot of effort into creating a fleshed out world, not specifically for the normal world-building purposes of fiction (e.g. The Silmarillion), but primarily to create a context for you to bounce off of, almost a mental "playground?" for you to build your own reactions and interpretations of pieces, processes, and events. The author describes it in various ways, and I find some of them very funny out of context.

It's not fun.

If you're a gamer, you'll hate it and should not play it.

Gamers rise up.

If you had to root for an NFL team other than the Green Bay Packers, which one would you pick, and why?

The team I root for when the Packers are out of contention is actually the Detroit Lions! I have a very defined conceptualization of the North where like, the Bears are my primary / traditional enemy rival, the Vikings are my oblique kinda stinky rival, and the Lions are my friendly rival. I'm far from alone in admiring and being happy on how your team and organization have built up a really honest, solid foundation of quality.

What's your favorite species of beetle?

Definitely the ladybug (i.e. the ladybird beetle). It's up there with butterflies, dragonflies, and moths as my favorite insects, probably second behind butterflies. I love the striking coloration and pattern of their elytra, which, at rest, reminds me of a coat of arms on a shield. When I was little, I had a school nature event that involved getting really up close with ladybugs, which was very special to me.

What kinds of music do you like to listen to?

I acceptably like most music, and am usually chill listening to whatever's on in some context with other people. But for what I actually listen to myself? The traditional split is that I have two kinds of music. One is video game (or occasionally movie) music, especially from Nintendo games. Lots of types fall under here, but I have a traditional preference for the atmospheric, magical, contemplative, the gentle, even a bit sad.

The video games I value most musically are Super Mario Galaxy, Kirby 64, and Mother. I voraciously consume both OSTs and fan remixes. I'll give you a sampler of my video game music here.

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLUdZjnw6wP9BF3zeFxdSHFZHGrl3V4bqI&si=X6Ow_UmVmkVvh0EO

The other half is what I'll call "folk music." It primarily comprises usually non-English folk music, but has some non-English military music, and English music that is a bit hard to categorize, but feels appropriate here. Cultures whose folk music I am or have been especially partial to include Finnish, Russian, Georgian, Greek, and Occitan. It often shares the energy I described for my video game music, but is a bit more intense overall. I'll give you a sampler of my folk music here too.

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLUdZjnw6wP9CkG29TcpiF8D3TThxr4d6h&si=ooRweNJA47YDe4QT

For both playlists, if actual video content appears, that is likely important to me too.

If you regularly operate a motor vehicle, what is your preferred speed on roads where the speed limit is 55 miles per hour?

I don't at this present moment, but I have done so enough to have a defined answer to this question. My general mentality on the highway is a center of around 5 over, with a range of 55-65 being likely for me. That's easy for me to remember and reasonably in the flow of traffic. I'm generally not a huge fan of driving and am distractable, so I like to keep it simple and safe.

What are your favorite and least favorite aspects of forum culture?

First I'll talk about all of (pure Smogon forums, PS chat, Discord chat) and then I'll boil down to specifically forums in that.

My favorite thing is how accessible these platforms make it to be social with people whom I share interests with. That's something I struggle with some in real life, especially with how niche my interests can be. I've also experienced an evolution where, my interest in Pokemon is not so much aligning with the core of these fora, but I've stuck around long enough to find people and communities and outlets that still share my other interests, and who I've formed bonds with and where I can feel familiar and at home in.

On that bonds note, though, my least favorite part is how warped social relationships can be and feel. I joined these fora young, and I did not realize how many people where perfectly friendly and nice when we interacted, but who, behind the scenes, either did not give a shit about me, or were actively malicious or predatory. I got a lot of grief from a lot of moments across a lot of years where I thought people would do the right thing for me, either because they cared about me, or because they cared about doing what's right in the general sense, but they just didn't. The facts are, there's a lot of people over the years I've mutually respected and enjoyed being around, but, across over 10 years, the amount of genuine friends I've made, enough bond that we would make sacrifices for each other, is probably about 10. Part of that was a naive me overly assuming familiarity, part of that was people being kinda awful sometimes.

Specifically for forum forums versus live chats, I like the permanence of posts and delay in communication, which incentive me to make thought-out material and make it more plausible for other people to see them. That delay makes me generally benefit from some more immediate social outlets, whether online or in person, though.

What was the best question you ever made for the Trivia room?

This is a good question, but I don't have a specific remembered question coming to mind. For reference, I left the Trivia scene probably around 8 years ago. I'll note, though, that I had clear preferences among the categories: Science and Geography > Pokemon >> Society and the Humanities >> Arts and Entertainment.

 

[Adeleine]

Thoughts on Super Bowl XXXII?

I'm not particularly invested in sports history before my lifespan, but I am obligated to pout a bit about that one.

 

[Adeleine]

are you a page 53 enjoyer by any chance?

what?