The Corpse Brigadier

I went through my phone and my diary today to try to figure out what 2024 was like for me, and... I honestly did a lot and had a pretty cool time of things before the final few months saw fit to kick me in the teeth. I felt a little down that I didn't find as much time for writing as I did in previous years, but actually looking things over, I've definitely been flexing a lot creative muscles elsewhere. It certainly wasn't the year I wanted in all respects, but it was a full and memorable one.

So anyway, in 2024 I...
( ... )

I don't know quite what to hope for from 2025. There's a lot of things that make me anxious. Still, I feel like I can make it through a lot, and that's pretty reassuring.

I had a pretty tiring few weeks in which very little immediate actually happened.

My spouse left for their annual autumn vacation Internet forum meet up, during which I routinely experience some manner of medical event (this time it was just a mild cold), and my schedule has been somewhat out of whack ever since. I got some news (good!) on the fourteenth that I'll eventually talk more about outside of f-lock, and I've been running around scheduling stuff around it. I've gotten in the habit of making shokupan weekly, and I'm enjoying a life of eating highly aesthetic Ghibliesque breakfasts most mornings.

Also actually managed to scrape myself together sufficiently to sign up for Yuletide again this year, and I am psyched.

Yuletide Letter for CorpseBrigadier on Ao3

Dear Author,

Hiya! Let me thank you for taking the time to write for me this fine Yuletide, and let me offer you my earnest congratulations on your great taste in 1990s interactive media. This is an exchange for which I have a great deal of love, and I am exceedingly excited for whatever it is you end up making for me. I've tried my best throughout this letter to give some prompts/ideas for a wide range of writing styles. However, I really want to emphasize that I'm very interested in you feeling free to flex your creative muscles. If the prompts listed aren't quite doing it for you, I am a genuine believer in optional details being optional, and I would love to see whatever creative production you are inspired to make out of these canons/characters.

Note: I am open to treats on ao3 and should have them activated.

[NOTE: This letter will be functionally complete at the time it is made public, but it may be tweaked through the end of sign-ups.]


General (DNWs, Likes, Opt-Ins) | Betrayal at Krondor | Final Fantasy VI | Final Fantasy Tactics | Mini-Challenge Specific Prompts

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General (DNWs, Likes, Opt-Ins, Etc...)

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Betrayal at Krondor

The Canon: This game was pretty influential in my youth, and the two main characters (Gorath and Owyn) were one of my earliest ships, even if they were visually portrayed by what seemed to be Dynamix office workers pulled aside to wear cheap Halloween wigs. I adore this canon's sense of an expansive, varied world, its focus on the growing relationship between two unlikely friends, and its willingness to brutalize the player with both unforgiving status ailments and a thoroughly crushing finale.

Where to Find It (and Canon Review Resources): The game used to be legally free via Sierra's website, but this was back in the 90s. You can get it on GOG for $5.99 though. There used to be a very helpful website called BAK Help Web that contained numerous pieces of information, walkthrough materials, and NPC transcripts, but it is now offline. You can still find it in largely archived form here via the Wayback Machine. The "Text Web" section is very useful for finding story content.
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Final Fantasy VI

The Canon: I have a deep and profound nostalgia for the final Final Fantasy before Final Fantasy VII (and all the changes it wrought), and I think it remains one of the strongest installments in the series. I love how well it combines hard-hitting character drama with the complete absurdity of RPGs in general, and I love its sweeping, poignant explorations of human relationships in equal measure to its willingness to embrace that sometimes those relationships are offset by a talking purple octopus.

Where to Find It (and Canon Review Resources): I am not super up-to-date as to the best and most accessible version of the game these days, as it has been ported many many times. If you want a script refresher, however, there are a number of scripts up on GameFAQs (the SNES version being the one with which I'm most familiar). If you have an emulator and wish to skip to specific save states, somebody put together a nice collection of them here.

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Final Fantasy Tactics

The Canon: This is a 1998 tactical RPG by Square-Enix that I just really really like. I love how immensely unrepentantly bleak it is, how it's full of Church-flavored horror, and how it is just filled to the brim with unhappy families. I'm entirely here for political backstabbing and endless misery, 24/7, in this sad little world of grid-based warfare. I love pretty much everything within it, and I would frankly be happy to receive almost anything for this fandom.

Where to Find It: If you haven't played FFT for a while or are unfamiliar with it and want to get an idea of what it's like, you can check out scripts of the dialogue here (PSX translation) and here (PSP translation). I also have a big, comprehensive list of scene-by-scene script comparisons on my personal website. There's also a very comprehensive Let's Play here (PSX translations). If you have an emulator and wish to skip to specific save states, somebody put together a nice collection of them here.
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Extra Challenges

Art Prompts (for the Wrapping Paper Challenge)

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IF Prompts

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It's been a reasonably pleasant year, all things considered. After the complete overwhelm of 2023 (Get a doctorate! Get a job!), it's been nice to coast for a bit. While I've had a reasonably busy time of things in 2024, there's not been the same sense of everything being suddenly and dramatically changing, which has been nice.

( Other sundry updates... )

I've apparently obsessed with this 27 year old game for 6 whole years now. I baked it a cake. :]

( Flimsy excuse to experiment with isomalt below the cut )

Candy Hearts Letter for CorpseBrigadier on Ao3

Dear Creator,

Let me open by commending on you for having the similar exquisite taste in imaginary relationships to myself and by thanking you in advance for whatever you feel inspired to create me. As somebody stoked about the low stakes and bite-sized nature of the exchange, let me also say that I hope you find an occasion to experiment and have fun! While I've provided some ideas below about what I'm interested in for the canons/ships/mediums I've requested, I'm a firm proponent of optional details being optional. Given that most of my requested ships trend towards the unconventional, unintuitive, or the absurd, I'm very happy for people to let their muse carry them to interesting places with them.

[NOTE: This letter will be functionally complete at the time it is made public, but it may be tweaked to adjust details/add requests through the end of sign-ups.]


General (DNWs, Likes, Opt-Ins) | Original Work | "The Big Snit" | John Donne | Final Fantasy VI | Final Fantasy Tactics

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General (DNWs, Likes, Opt-Ins, Etc...)

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Original Work

[Requesting FIC]

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"The Big Snit"

[Requesting ART]

This 1985 piece by Richard Condie (all glorious ten minutes of it viewable here on Internet Archive) is one of my favorite short films of all time. I love the juxtaposition of incredibly high and low stakes upheavals, the surreal nature of the characters' eccentricities, and the extent to which the whole world is jam-packed with beautiful visual clutter. For this art, I'd love to see something that mimics the visuals of the film, and I'd also love to see something that frenzied/absurd nature of this setting and renders it in a different style.

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John Donne

[Requesting FIC]

I really love John Donne. Despite his groddy misogyny and his general groddy groddiness, Donne’s just so damn good at what he does, which is writing horny poetry in which the most heterogeneous ideas are yoked by violence together. I would love to read some horny re-yokings of those ideas this winter.

Feel free for any of these to yoke in some more Donne poetry if you wish to. I will never say no to more Donne. I might have to double check something, but I have read or skimmed every Donne poem at least once.


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Final Fantasy VI

[Requesting ART
or FIC]

I think of all the Final Fantasy games I've played, VI is the one that is most consistently good at what it does throughout. It's beautiful at marrying the surreal and goofy to the profound and operatic. Its ensemble cast is full of tropey, loveable characters that pull on the heartstrings with just a few brisk narrative moves. It's recurring focus on hope, obligation, and families of various stripes is brilliantly done throughout, and I'm hopelessly fond of it even over two decades after first encountering it.

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Final Fantasy Tactics

[Requesting ART or FIC]

This game has been my major fandom for a few years now. I love how immensely unrepentantly bleak it is, how it's full of Church-flavored horror, and how it is just filled to the brim with unhappy families. I'm entirely here for political backstabbing and endless misery 24/7 in this sad little world of grid-based warfare. I love pretty much everything within it, and I would frankly be happy to receive almost anything for this fandom.

( Read more... )

I have not been posting for months on account of landing a job (not a terribly exciting one, but still vastly better paying than gradstudenthood), which has required a lot of schedule tinkering. I've been forced against my better judgement and inclinations to become a morning person, which is somewhat at odds with much of my prior adult life. I've become reasonably good at working out in the morning and going to bed at a sensible hour. I've yet to become reasonably good at engaging consistently in all my prior hobbies. (Most of my various writing projects have stalled, and I couldn't muster the wherewithal to prep for either a ___-tober or Yuletide).

I managed to do/see a lot of one off stuff locally in the lead up to said job. I saw one of my favorite musicians live, caught a very nice series of festivals around town, and gawked at a lot of melodramatic local politics. One of the things I've definitely managed to accomplish this year has been getting more engaged with the ins and outs of government at the municipal level--which I would be proud of were my motivations not so clearly mixed up with my love of watching a petty slapfight. As I sink deeper into the abyss of middle-aged squareness, I've become a regular city council audience member, eager to watch first hand as people twenty years my elder fight with one another for ten minutes over approving the previous meeting's minutes.

All things considered, I'm pretty content with my current mode of existing, although part of that is just being able to just exist without having to constantly push towards the next doctoral milestone/job hunt lead/etc... 2023 has been incredibly intense for me, and I'm glad to finally be in the midst of something that looks to be a boring patch.

My life is a mess of deep cleaning, finally catching up with irl friends/relations, and reading this fascinating book on childhood in the middle ages (may or may not result in more Orinus fic someday). I got a chance to make my favorite weird ice cream (pictured below with cake, coffee, and very aesthetic dishes), my cabinets are finally done, and I sent out some handwritten fic to people who requested it following this tumblr post re: what we should all do following the ao3 DDoS attacks. (People who want an FFT double drabble and are willing to trust me with a physical address may still inquire)

( Desserts! )

Also became one of those few lucky people to win a gift card from blood giving. My suffering paid off. :]

Ao3 may be down, but this will not stop me from providing piping hot Mustadio/Worker 8 content.

Part of my series of 1,000 word rarepair fics and definitely G-rated. Not terribly romantic, but Worker 8 tries.

Mirrored on my website and tumblr.

( Mustadio moved smoothly through the tavern... )

I did it. Yesterday, I unlocked a new drop down option on forms where you have to give a prefix before your name. I stood for an hour and a half in terrible, hot, partially velvet robes and was given a piece of paper that entitles me to practice book medicine.