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Yuletide here we come!
Holy moly, it's my twentieth consecutive Yuletide! Time for a letter! (If you're just scoping out letters and find something that interests you, treats are enabled on my account.)
Requested fandoms this year:
* Astrologaster (Video Game)
* Elsinore (Video Game)
* The Frogs - Sondheim/Shevelove/Lane
* The Map and the Territory - A. M. Tuomala
* Terra Nil (Video Game)
* Tiny Bookshop (Video Game)
* The Wandering Village (Video Game)
* When you see a lore video for a franchise you know nothing about (Short Film - Sir Matteus)
Video game heavy slate this time around! Letter behind the cut!
Dear Yuletide Author,
Hi! If you have or will browse through my other assorted Dear Author letters over the years, you'll probably notice I've cribbed a good portion of this letter (including pretty much this entire preface) from them, with some changes. You know how it goes. Besides, plagiarizing from yourself is the only plagiarizing that's actually reasonably ethical! :p
That said, hello! Welcome to my letter, I hope it helps to alleviate any possible stress over your assignment instead of making it worse. I've tossed out some generalities in my assignment itself, but I know some of those are a bit more loose than others. Which on the one hand gives you a lot of leeway, but on the other can be a bit intimidating, so I'll be trying to spitball a few ideas in each fandom to give you a starting point if you feel like you need one.
If you're trying to glean my personality or general demeanor from my journal here, then I am extremely sorry for its sparseness over the last few years, but feel free to check out my tumblr, my bluesky, or even my reddit account if those are the kind of thing that helps you out. If you could care less, then great, carry on!
My general likes include banter, happy endings (although I am perfectly fine with bittersweet or even sad if that's where your muse takes you), throwing in little canon details that you might miss on first read but totally make you squee come the second time around, wit, humor, dramatic irony, and missing scenes. I also like slice-of-life stuff, as is kind of evident some of my requests this year, although what a slice-of-life looks like certainly depends on the life in question.
As much as I love fic that feels like it could fit right into canon, I also have a soft spot for AUs, so if you get bitten by an AU bug, go right ahead, I'll more than likely adore it. Another thing that I often like is outsider POVs, so if you get a bunny that involves that, I would be completely on board.
Dislikes aren't many. Unless otherwise specified, I'm not really a huge fan of major character death for Yuletide. Also, and I really doubt this will be much of a problem, but in the interest of full disclosure, depiction of injury to fingernails or toenails skeeves me out more than I can even begin to describe, so if somehow you have a bunny where that might come up, even if it wouldn't really fit in the majority of the fandoms I requested, maybe try to avoid it? Other than that, though, I won't really have much trouble with where you decide to take the fic! (I do have one fandom-specific DNW this year, which is in my signup for that fandom, but just the one!)
Also, don't feel tied down to only the characters I've requested, in those fandoms in which characters are actually requested. You can totally feel free to add ones that aren't listed, even in a reasonably large capacity, as long as (this probably goes without saying) you keep the focus on the requests. :)
And now that I've blathered on quite long enough, on to my requests! It'll go as follows. The requests themselves, a little bit on the fandom, how to access it (should you either need a refresher or decide you just cannot write what we matched on and need to write something else badly! In the case of video games, I tend to link the Steam version and also name other formats the game is available in to the best of my knowledge) and why I love it, and then a bit more elaboration on my requests themselves (And please, do not take the order or relative lengths of the various elaborations as any indicator as to which fandoms I want more. I would be overly thrilled with a gift in ANY of them!)
Enjoy the prompts, and have fun writing!
-![[archiveofourown.org profile]](https://p2.dreamwidth.org/b164c54b26e4/-/archiveofourown.org/favicon.ico)
dizmo
Astrologaster (Video Game)
* Any (No characters nominated)
Every single character in this game is a delight, so I would be utterly delighted about a fic exploring any of their lives, in or out of Simon's office! We get such fascinating glimpses of what goes on between the gameplay portions that fleshing any of it out would be great, or something from before or post-canon, too! Let your imagination run wild, but if you want any specific guidance, I'll toss some specific character promptlets in my letter.
Astrologaster! I found this game basically just in time to nominate it and played through the whole thing in like two days! Available on Steam and, I believe, Nintendo Switch. Be an unlicensed doctor/astrologer in Elizabethan times (who actually existed)! Consult the stars for solutions to their maladies and/or general life advice!Maybe sleep with a few patients! Learn about various drama and just plain interesting happenings going on! All while a madrigal choir sings an introduction to each patient session. It is such a blast.
I agonized over who to nominate and despaired over the thought of leaving anyone out. So no nominated character means, obviously, you can write about anyone in the game! I'd really adore anything, as I miss them all already, but I'll just spitball a few things here. (If the bunny that hits you relates to a character I don't have listed here, don't look at it as me not wanting anything about that particular character, just that I couldn't think of anything more specific than 'more please!')
-Simon, first and foremost, is an obvious go to. I love his idiosyncratic diagnostic methods! More of them would be great, whether it's more with any or all of the cast we have already or new and interesting characters you divine. Or even what he gets up to aside from "doctor"ing (Yes, up to and inclusive of ye olde Coitus post consultatio, if you so desire.)!
-Poor Avis. More about her in general would be lovely. Maybe change her fate so she gets a happy ending somehow?
-What other interesting mishaps does Sybil get into with things her husband sends her from the new world? So many potential pitfalls in the Columbian exchange.
-What does happen at Lambeth Palace? In detail. >:D
-How did Richard Smith come up with Riccardo? What does he do to get in character?
-Interesting shenanigans of the world of Elizabethan theater, centering either around Humphrey Bell or Emilia Lanier.
-While we're speaking of Humphrey, what does the Emma/Humphrey happily ever after look like?
That's just a bit of spitballing, out of necessity, but really anything that expands on this delightful game, I'd be happy to read!
--
Elsinore (Video Game)
* Ophelia
I've seen every ending the game has to offer, and somehow still I'd love *more*. What other roads can you see Ophelia walking down? How does she get there? Feel free to use absolutely anyone the game has to offer, or if you feel like, do what the game itself did and pull from the broader Shakespearean multiverse! Although if nothing really grabs at you as far as a different ending option, I'd love to see some interesting slice of life moments for Ophelia as she navigates the strangeness that living in a time loop must be. (X Ways Ophelia Kicked Hamlet Out of Her Room in the Morning, anyone?)
Elsinore! Available on Steam. Be Ophelia! Time loop your way through Hamlet! Try to make it not a tragedy! Fail to make it not a tragedy, but sometimes, at least, it's less a tragedy than others! Exceptionally well-woven story loops and some huge surprises here and there. Love this game to bits.
My prompt says it all! This is one of the very few fandoms where I honestly wouldn't prefer a perfectly happy ending, because none of them really are in the canon, although there are some where she manages to wring out at least some happiness on the way, so that's certainly an option! I'm also not kidding about pulling in other Shakespeareans if you're so inclined, although please don't be obliged, obviously. There's a wide list of tragic characters that would lead to intriguing interplay... or even the clash that could result of someone from a comedy influencing this deeply disturbed castle of Elsinore. But if there are any other 'I wish I could do that instead' endings you thought of while playing, I'd also love to see how you see them shaking out! If the new ending idea doesn't work out for you, I do love the slice-of-timeloop-life idea too. You have to do something to keep it from being monotonous.At least until that 'something' just turns into becoming slightly eldritch horror and just killing everyone with a word. Whatever you write, enjoy it!!
--
The Frogs - Sondheim/Shevelove/Lane
* Ariadne
* Dionysos
The bits the show shows of the Dionysos and Ariadne relationship are just so sweet! I'd love to see more of it! Whether it's pre-canon and an exploration of the brief time they had together, up to and including exploring her death, during canon, expanding on their chat in Hades, or even post-canon, where maybe he comes back and visits! I just wish I'd gotten more of them! And now I can!
The Frogs! A very limited run show loosely based on the Aristophanes original! You can find the OBC soundtrack on Spotify, Apple Music, and of course other spots where music can be acquired. Sadly no proshot exists of the show although in the way of many musicals, it's possible to find assorted clips on youtube. (There was one complete one up last year but sadly it seems to be gone now.) It's funny, fun, and moving by turns and absolutely worth every moment spent listening!
I love the tantalizing bits we get of the Dionysos and Ariadne's relationship. (I get "Ariadne" stuck in my head with remarkable frequency ever since discovering the show.) Obviously this is one of those exceptions to not preferring character death in Yuletide fics, as the canon itself very much explores it, including in the context of their relationship, so if you want to cover Ariadne's death in what you write for me, I'd certainly welcome it. I'd just love to see more of this Dionysus and this Ariadne. They're so sweet.
--
The Map and the Territory - A. M. Tuomala
* Kondala m'Barata Eshusikinde
* Rukha Masreen
Eshu! Rukha! I love these two so much it hurts! The resilience that they have to have! The friendship that they manage to forge after getting thrown together by happenstance amidst, needless to say, troubling times. I just want more of them. Missing scenes during their travel, what happens as they find a way forward together at the end of the book, just everything about making your way through calamity and how they handle it. Give me more of them and I will be so happy you did.
Absolutely fabulous fantasy book, available here from the publisher or, as might be expected, on amazon and I presume at least other assorted online resources. It starts off as a fresh catastrophe striking the world is suddenly stumbled into, and it's a hell of a backdrop for some incredibly realized characters (and bonus canon queerness). I love Eshu and Rukha/Fern with my entire being. Like, seriously, even if you have no intention of writing this fandom for me, I still recommend the book on its own merits. Because seriously.
Anyway! This is a definite case of I love this canon and I just want more. I love both of these characters, I love how they play off of one another, and I love how their distinctly different outlooks on what's going on around them mesh and notably don't mesh. Everything is falling apart around them but if anyone can at least pick their way through, it's those two. What a dynamic duo. Toss in whoever else you'd like, of course (Beejan was also nominated and I do love his relationship with Eshu!) but please focus on their teamup. Do they find out what happened to Kondala City? What's going on in the Mirrorlands? How about Rukha's family? Seeing them come across somewhere else and more survivors would also be fascinating. Or hey, you can even take a hard left and give me an AU where none of this happened and they meet anyway! What shape would that friendhip take without the fires that forged it? Just put more into my grabby grabby hands!
--
Terra Nil (Video Game)
* Worldbuilding
This game, at its heart, is worldbuilding. I'd love to see an exploration of some of the interesting aspects of the game. What happened to what came before? Scenes from the decline and abandonment of the planet would be fascinating if you want to look into the past. Or look in on what's going on during the game! The trials and tribulations of being the one tasked to bring this utterly barren wasteland back to life. Being that person has got to feel a sort of a way. Or maybe shift a bit sideways and take a look at the lives of the animals that are cautiously making their way back into this habitat that's being recreated. A look into the future would be great, too. Do people (or aliens?) come back? How do they ensure not to recreate the mistakes of the past? I'd love to see any of this, or if another idea strikes your fancy, go for it!
Terra Nil! Available on Steam and also mobile app stores and Switch! It's basically the inverse of a city building game. You're using resources and placing buildings to restore the natural world to a blighted landscape! Once it's finished, you pack your buildings back up and fuck off! And it can get tricky! Nature can be a finicky beast!
I don't know that I have all that much to give you for this one that's not in the prompt. It's a joy to see the environments of this world coming back (I especially love that moment when the rains start to come and the greenery sprouts away from where you've directly placed it!) and to see a narrative around... basically any of it... Just yes. Love. Gimme!
--
Tiny Bookshop (Video Game)
* Maryam Debvoir
* Tilde Sankelund
"My Mary." Sob. They're totally together, as far as I can see. Is it recent? Is it old and rekindled? Or has it been continuous? I'd love a glimpse into the lives of these small town retired business owners. I'd love a look back at how they met, or growing established in their roles as business mainstays in Bookstonbury, or settling into retirement together. Give me something as cozy as the game is!
This game!!! First off, it's on Steam, where there is also a free demo available, as well as Switch! The former bookseller in me loves this game. The cozy gamer in me loves this game. Quaint little seaside town with a bunch of delightful people and I get to pull up in a trailer and sell books to them? Yes please, all day every day.
Anyway! My prompt! Tilde and Maryam! The hints are all there and more than a bit blatant, give me those sapphic retirees! Even the timeline for that relationship is up in the air. My personal suspicion is that Tilde retiring and closing up shop and then not being there as shop neighbors on the square day in and day out made the both of them realize what they were missing and have to really confront the Feelings and that there was more to them than just being friends, and then Tilde's hospital stay just went and compounded it. But there are so many options to explore if you have other thoughts on the matter! If you want to throw in Moira's thoughts on the matter, by all means do! I just want a lovely delightful time with these two in their golden years by the sea, watching the next generation of shopkeepers thriving while they do too.
--
The Wandering Village (Video Game)
* Onbu
Okay. What's it like to have a whole village of little people living on your back? The ways the village can interact with Onbu is limited, and we see a whole lot from the village's point of view, so I'd love to see what's going on from Onbu's. It's quite literally a vehicle to save the world. I'd love to know its thoughts and its relationship with the people on its back. I'm sure it comes to recognize the ones it sees regularly, for instance! There's quite a journey to be walking! Do not want: Detailed descriptions of the various ways to collect resources that actively harm Onbu. (The parasitic and fungal infections are fine to go into, but if you truly want to go into the blood and bile collection, make it rare and make it lightly touched on.)
Another game! Available, of course, on Steam, as well as Switch, Playstation, and Xbox. A village on the top of a ginormous six-legged dinosaur thing walking through a toxic postapocalyptic landscape? There’s a new take on city management for you.
So I’ve gotten to see and live and influence the village’s perspective. Now I want Onbu’s. We know that onbus are intelligent, so what does it make of all these people literally making a home on it? Is it like a shark and remoras? After all, the villagers do take care of infestations and infections and it doesn’t have to do much in return other than keep them off of the toxic ground. Is it fond of them? Does it look at them as a bit of a nuisance but one it can live with? If it refuses the suggested fork-in-the-road direction, what sort of reasons does it have? I’d be fascinated to hear!
--
When you see a lore video for a franchise you know nothing about (Short Film - Sir Matteus)
* Worldbuilding
Honestly, this is going to be about as open-ended as a request will be, which I know can be intimidating for Yuletide, but the video just offers so many delightful little teasers about things that could very obviously be expounded on that I give you all the rein you'd like to go into whatever you'd like, big or small! If you want specific prompts to either work from or maybe flip something in your brain that might give you a different idea, feel free to check my letter!
This video, people. Just. Oh man. It's found over here and it's a shade over a minute and a half of absolute gold. I consistently am cackling at this video whenever I watch it (which is admittedly more often than I'm sure the creator intended) and then promptly find myself just saying 'Arrrerrorer' with my very best R-rolls. It's exactly what it says on the tin and it's so very true to the experience of fantasy franchises, speaking as someone who's been a fan of a lot of them and as someone who has friends and family (and a husband!) who's into some that I'm not familiar with. It teases you into wanting more and that's why I'm here! I've even got some lovely Yuletide gifts for the fandom over the last couple years and they've only further whet my appetite more to see what else could be done with it!
That said, what I said in my signup is true. Anything you feel like writing spurred by the video, I would be perfectly delighted by. That said, I will now proceed to throw some half-baked ideas against the wall in case they either knock something loose in you or you want to take them and fully bake them. Here we go! What would live have been like for the Berkel Clans before leaving the land of Sus? What was the inciting incident in 1815 of 8 of the TA time that caused so many to leave? Are the Fuuuuuuk really as cowardly as advertised? What exactly was Klug-Klug up to? Have any stories from the Great War? How were Arrrerror's relations with the land of KepKep? What is up with Fussili Paganini anyway? How about those barely alluded to wizards? What was life like for any single member of one of the Berkel Clans at any point in the timeline? Any star-crossed inter-clan relationships? Murder mysteries? Adventuring parties? What sort of holidays do they have? What's coming of age like? Heroes? Villains not mentioned in this video? Little day to day dramas? Seriously, give me aaaanything! I will be beyond happy with it!
Requested fandoms this year:
* Astrologaster (Video Game)
* Elsinore (Video Game)
* The Frogs - Sondheim/Shevelove/Lane
* The Map and the Territory - A. M. Tuomala
* Terra Nil (Video Game)
* Tiny Bookshop (Video Game)
* The Wandering Village (Video Game)
* When you see a lore video for a franchise you know nothing about (Short Film - Sir Matteus)
Video game heavy slate this time around! Letter behind the cut!
Dear Yuletide Author,
Hi! If you have or will browse through my other assorted Dear Author letters over the years, you'll probably notice I've cribbed a good portion of this letter (including pretty much this entire preface) from them, with some changes. You know how it goes. Besides, plagiarizing from yourself is the only plagiarizing that's actually reasonably ethical! :p
That said, hello! Welcome to my letter, I hope it helps to alleviate any possible stress over your assignment instead of making it worse. I've tossed out some generalities in my assignment itself, but I know some of those are a bit more loose than others. Which on the one hand gives you a lot of leeway, but on the other can be a bit intimidating, so I'll be trying to spitball a few ideas in each fandom to give you a starting point if you feel like you need one.
If you're trying to glean my personality or general demeanor from my journal here, then I am extremely sorry for its sparseness over the last few years, but feel free to check out my tumblr, my bluesky, or even my reddit account if those are the kind of thing that helps you out. If you could care less, then great, carry on!
My general likes include banter, happy endings (although I am perfectly fine with bittersweet or even sad if that's where your muse takes you), throwing in little canon details that you might miss on first read but totally make you squee come the second time around, wit, humor, dramatic irony, and missing scenes. I also like slice-of-life stuff, as is kind of evident some of my requests this year, although what a slice-of-life looks like certainly depends on the life in question.
As much as I love fic that feels like it could fit right into canon, I also have a soft spot for AUs, so if you get bitten by an AU bug, go right ahead, I'll more than likely adore it. Another thing that I often like is outsider POVs, so if you get a bunny that involves that, I would be completely on board.
Dislikes aren't many. Unless otherwise specified, I'm not really a huge fan of major character death for Yuletide. Also, and I really doubt this will be much of a problem, but in the interest of full disclosure, depiction of injury to fingernails or toenails skeeves me out more than I can even begin to describe, so if somehow you have a bunny where that might come up, even if it wouldn't really fit in the majority of the fandoms I requested, maybe try to avoid it? Other than that, though, I won't really have much trouble with where you decide to take the fic! (I do have one fandom-specific DNW this year, which is in my signup for that fandom, but just the one!)
Also, don't feel tied down to only the characters I've requested, in those fandoms in which characters are actually requested. You can totally feel free to add ones that aren't listed, even in a reasonably large capacity, as long as (this probably goes without saying) you keep the focus on the requests. :)
And now that I've blathered on quite long enough, on to my requests! It'll go as follows. The requests themselves, a little bit on the fandom, how to access it (should you either need a refresher or decide you just cannot write what we matched on and need to write something else badly! In the case of video games, I tend to link the Steam version and also name other formats the game is available in to the best of my knowledge) and why I love it, and then a bit more elaboration on my requests themselves (And please, do not take the order or relative lengths of the various elaborations as any indicator as to which fandoms I want more. I would be overly thrilled with a gift in ANY of them!)
Enjoy the prompts, and have fun writing!
-
Astrologaster (Video Game)
* Any (No characters nominated)
Every single character in this game is a delight, so I would be utterly delighted about a fic exploring any of their lives, in or out of Simon's office! We get such fascinating glimpses of what goes on between the gameplay portions that fleshing any of it out would be great, or something from before or post-canon, too! Let your imagination run wild, but if you want any specific guidance, I'll toss some specific character promptlets in my letter.
Astrologaster! I found this game basically just in time to nominate it and played through the whole thing in like two days! Available on Steam and, I believe, Nintendo Switch. Be an unlicensed doctor/astrologer in Elizabethan times (who actually existed)! Consult the stars for solutions to their maladies and/or general life advice!
I agonized over who to nominate and despaired over the thought of leaving anyone out. So no nominated character means, obviously, you can write about anyone in the game! I'd really adore anything, as I miss them all already, but I'll just spitball a few things here. (If the bunny that hits you relates to a character I don't have listed here, don't look at it as me not wanting anything about that particular character, just that I couldn't think of anything more specific than 'more please!')
-Simon, first and foremost, is an obvious go to. I love his idiosyncratic diagnostic methods! More of them would be great, whether it's more with any or all of the cast we have already or new and interesting characters you divine. Or even what he gets up to aside from "doctor"ing (Yes, up to and inclusive of ye olde Coitus post consultatio, if you so desire.)!
-Poor Avis. More about her in general would be lovely. Maybe change her fate so she gets a happy ending somehow?
-What other interesting mishaps does Sybil get into with things her husband sends her from the new world? So many potential pitfalls in the Columbian exchange.
-What does happen at Lambeth Palace? In detail. >:D
-How did Richard Smith come up with Riccardo? What does he do to get in character?
-Interesting shenanigans of the world of Elizabethan theater, centering either around Humphrey Bell or Emilia Lanier.
-While we're speaking of Humphrey, what does the Emma/Humphrey happily ever after look like?
That's just a bit of spitballing, out of necessity, but really anything that expands on this delightful game, I'd be happy to read!
--
Elsinore (Video Game)
* Ophelia
I've seen every ending the game has to offer, and somehow still I'd love *more*. What other roads can you see Ophelia walking down? How does she get there? Feel free to use absolutely anyone the game has to offer, or if you feel like, do what the game itself did and pull from the broader Shakespearean multiverse! Although if nothing really grabs at you as far as a different ending option, I'd love to see some interesting slice of life moments for Ophelia as she navigates the strangeness that living in a time loop must be. (X Ways Ophelia Kicked Hamlet Out of Her Room in the Morning, anyone?)
Elsinore! Available on Steam. Be Ophelia! Time loop your way through Hamlet! Try to make it not a tragedy! Fail to make it not a tragedy, but sometimes, at least, it's less a tragedy than others! Exceptionally well-woven story loops and some huge surprises here and there. Love this game to bits.
My prompt says it all! This is one of the very few fandoms where I honestly wouldn't prefer a perfectly happy ending, because none of them really are in the canon, although there are some where she manages to wring out at least some happiness on the way, so that's certainly an option! I'm also not kidding about pulling in other Shakespeareans if you're so inclined, although please don't be obliged, obviously. There's a wide list of tragic characters that would lead to intriguing interplay... or even the clash that could result of someone from a comedy influencing this deeply disturbed castle of Elsinore. But if there are any other 'I wish I could do that instead' endings you thought of while playing, I'd also love to see how you see them shaking out! If the new ending idea doesn't work out for you, I do love the slice-of-timeloop-life idea too. You have to do something to keep it from being monotonous.
--
The Frogs - Sondheim/Shevelove/Lane
* Ariadne
* Dionysos
The bits the show shows of the Dionysos and Ariadne relationship are just so sweet! I'd love to see more of it! Whether it's pre-canon and an exploration of the brief time they had together, up to and including exploring her death, during canon, expanding on their chat in Hades, or even post-canon, where maybe he comes back and visits! I just wish I'd gotten more of them! And now I can!
The Frogs! A very limited run show loosely based on the Aristophanes original! You can find the OBC soundtrack on Spotify, Apple Music, and of course other spots where music can be acquired. Sadly no proshot exists of the show although in the way of many musicals, it's possible to find assorted clips on youtube. (There was one complete one up last year but sadly it seems to be gone now.) It's funny, fun, and moving by turns and absolutely worth every moment spent listening!
I love the tantalizing bits we get of the Dionysos and Ariadne's relationship. (I get "Ariadne" stuck in my head with remarkable frequency ever since discovering the show.) Obviously this is one of those exceptions to not preferring character death in Yuletide fics, as the canon itself very much explores it, including in the context of their relationship, so if you want to cover Ariadne's death in what you write for me, I'd certainly welcome it. I'd just love to see more of this Dionysus and this Ariadne. They're so sweet.
--
The Map and the Territory - A. M. Tuomala
* Kondala m'Barata Eshusikinde
* Rukha Masreen
Eshu! Rukha! I love these two so much it hurts! The resilience that they have to have! The friendship that they manage to forge after getting thrown together by happenstance amidst, needless to say, troubling times. I just want more of them. Missing scenes during their travel, what happens as they find a way forward together at the end of the book, just everything about making your way through calamity and how they handle it. Give me more of them and I will be so happy you did.
Absolutely fabulous fantasy book, available here from the publisher or, as might be expected, on amazon and I presume at least other assorted online resources. It starts off as a fresh catastrophe striking the world is suddenly stumbled into, and it's a hell of a backdrop for some incredibly realized characters (and bonus canon queerness). I love Eshu and Rukha/Fern with my entire being. Like, seriously, even if you have no intention of writing this fandom for me, I still recommend the book on its own merits. Because seriously.
Anyway! This is a definite case of I love this canon and I just want more. I love both of these characters, I love how they play off of one another, and I love how their distinctly different outlooks on what's going on around them mesh and notably don't mesh. Everything is falling apart around them but if anyone can at least pick their way through, it's those two. What a dynamic duo. Toss in whoever else you'd like, of course (Beejan was also nominated and I do love his relationship with Eshu!) but please focus on their teamup. Do they find out what happened to Kondala City? What's going on in the Mirrorlands? How about Rukha's family? Seeing them come across somewhere else and more survivors would also be fascinating. Or hey, you can even take a hard left and give me an AU where none of this happened and they meet anyway! What shape would that friendhip take without the fires that forged it? Just put more into my grabby grabby hands!
--
Terra Nil (Video Game)
* Worldbuilding
This game, at its heart, is worldbuilding. I'd love to see an exploration of some of the interesting aspects of the game. What happened to what came before? Scenes from the decline and abandonment of the planet would be fascinating if you want to look into the past. Or look in on what's going on during the game! The trials and tribulations of being the one tasked to bring this utterly barren wasteland back to life. Being that person has got to feel a sort of a way. Or maybe shift a bit sideways and take a look at the lives of the animals that are cautiously making their way back into this habitat that's being recreated. A look into the future would be great, too. Do people (or aliens?) come back? How do they ensure not to recreate the mistakes of the past? I'd love to see any of this, or if another idea strikes your fancy, go for it!
Terra Nil! Available on Steam and also mobile app stores and Switch! It's basically the inverse of a city building game. You're using resources and placing buildings to restore the natural world to a blighted landscape! Once it's finished, you pack your buildings back up and fuck off! And it can get tricky! Nature can be a finicky beast!
I don't know that I have all that much to give you for this one that's not in the prompt. It's a joy to see the environments of this world coming back (I especially love that moment when the rains start to come and the greenery sprouts away from where you've directly placed it!) and to see a narrative around... basically any of it... Just yes. Love. Gimme!
--
Tiny Bookshop (Video Game)
* Maryam Debvoir
* Tilde Sankelund
"My Mary." Sob. They're totally together, as far as I can see. Is it recent? Is it old and rekindled? Or has it been continuous? I'd love a glimpse into the lives of these small town retired business owners. I'd love a look back at how they met, or growing established in their roles as business mainstays in Bookstonbury, or settling into retirement together. Give me something as cozy as the game is!
This game!!! First off, it's on Steam, where there is also a free demo available, as well as Switch! The former bookseller in me loves this game. The cozy gamer in me loves this game. Quaint little seaside town with a bunch of delightful people and I get to pull up in a trailer and sell books to them? Yes please, all day every day.
Anyway! My prompt! Tilde and Maryam! The hints are all there and more than a bit blatant, give me those sapphic retirees! Even the timeline for that relationship is up in the air. My personal suspicion is that Tilde retiring and closing up shop and then not being there as shop neighbors on the square day in and day out made the both of them realize what they were missing and have to really confront the Feelings and that there was more to them than just being friends, and then Tilde's hospital stay just went and compounded it. But there are so many options to explore if you have other thoughts on the matter! If you want to throw in Moira's thoughts on the matter, by all means do! I just want a lovely delightful time with these two in their golden years by the sea, watching the next generation of shopkeepers thriving while they do too.
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The Wandering Village (Video Game)
* Onbu
Okay. What's it like to have a whole village of little people living on your back? The ways the village can interact with Onbu is limited, and we see a whole lot from the village's point of view, so I'd love to see what's going on from Onbu's. It's quite literally a vehicle to save the world. I'd love to know its thoughts and its relationship with the people on its back. I'm sure it comes to recognize the ones it sees regularly, for instance! There's quite a journey to be walking! Do not want: Detailed descriptions of the various ways to collect resources that actively harm Onbu. (The parasitic and fungal infections are fine to go into, but if you truly want to go into the blood and bile collection, make it rare and make it lightly touched on.)
Another game! Available, of course, on Steam, as well as Switch, Playstation, and Xbox. A village on the top of a ginormous six-legged dinosaur thing walking through a toxic postapocalyptic landscape? There’s a new take on city management for you.
So I’ve gotten to see and live and influence the village’s perspective. Now I want Onbu’s. We know that onbus are intelligent, so what does it make of all these people literally making a home on it? Is it like a shark and remoras? After all, the villagers do take care of infestations and infections and it doesn’t have to do much in return other than keep them off of the toxic ground. Is it fond of them? Does it look at them as a bit of a nuisance but one it can live with? If it refuses the suggested fork-in-the-road direction, what sort of reasons does it have? I’d be fascinated to hear!
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When you see a lore video for a franchise you know nothing about (Short Film - Sir Matteus)
* Worldbuilding
Honestly, this is going to be about as open-ended as a request will be, which I know can be intimidating for Yuletide, but the video just offers so many delightful little teasers about things that could very obviously be expounded on that I give you all the rein you'd like to go into whatever you'd like, big or small! If you want specific prompts to either work from or maybe flip something in your brain that might give you a different idea, feel free to check my letter!
This video, people. Just. Oh man. It's found over here and it's a shade over a minute and a half of absolute gold. I consistently am cackling at this video whenever I watch it (which is admittedly more often than I'm sure the creator intended) and then promptly find myself just saying 'Arrrerrorer' with my very best R-rolls. It's exactly what it says on the tin and it's so very true to the experience of fantasy franchises, speaking as someone who's been a fan of a lot of them and as someone who has friends and family (and a husband!) who's into some that I'm not familiar with. It teases you into wanting more and that's why I'm here! I've even got some lovely Yuletide gifts for the fandom over the last couple years and they've only further whet my appetite more to see what else could be done with it!
That said, what I said in my signup is true. Anything you feel like writing spurred by the video, I would be perfectly delighted by. That said, I will now proceed to throw some half-baked ideas against the wall in case they either knock something loose in you or you want to take them and fully bake them. Here we go! What would live have been like for the Berkel Clans before leaving the land of Sus? What was the inciting incident in 1815 of 8 of the TA time that caused so many to leave? Are the Fuuuuuuk really as cowardly as advertised? What exactly was Klug-Klug up to? Have any stories from the Great War? How were Arrrerror's relations with the land of KepKep? What is up with Fussili Paganini anyway? How about those barely alluded to wizards? What was life like for any single member of one of the Berkel Clans at any point in the timeline? Any star-crossed inter-clan relationships? Murder mysteries? Adventuring parties? What sort of holidays do they have? What's coming of age like? Heroes? Villains not mentioned in this video? Little day to day dramas? Seriously, give me aaaanything! I will be beyond happy with it!