xcx, webhome, self harm

2022 05 23

xenoblade chronicles x

over the last couple of dayds, we've been watching our friend play xenoblade chronicles x, a wii u game that came out in 2015.

we first played it in January 2016. our wii u and the games on it were really important for our mental health!

we played xenoblade x because of shulk in super smash bros. on wii u. the trophies seemed super interesting and the front cover of X in the store was also very interesting!

it was unlike anything we ever played. so we didn't play it for about two months because the game's combat tutorial is crap.

eventually we pushed through and leart the basics of the art palette, the place where you select arts, basically attacks and abilities.

we had never really been exposed to full science fiction media before this! we also had never played a video game that actually attempted to talk about mental health and explore it in healthy ways.

it also had mechs and incredible environment design and amazing character writing.

over many, many years since January 2016, we've played the game for close to 700 hours, according to the wii u daily log. we think games launchers should have the 3ds daily log mandated by law.

our favourite aspects of the game are its build system, environment design, music and characters! the game focuses heavily on its combat mechanics and side quests, and both are pretty well designed. the level design and gameplay can do a really good job of making it feel like you're exploring a dangerous, uncharted planet, which is so awesome! it doesn't always do that, though, and we wish it was able to pull that off more frequently.

the xeno series is a special interest for us, and xenoblade X is the catalyst for that! the game does quite a lot of things differently from, at least the other xenoblades, but the reasons we liked X are, mostly, also the reasons we like the other games in the series! sweet!

guide

since feburary 2022 (maybe slightly earlier), we have been writing a guide for xenoblade x, directly inspired by a video author named Chuggaconroy's let's plays of xenoblade 1 and xenoblade 2, which are very comprehensive and well organised.

we wanted to create a document where we could locate all the information within the game, that was well designed and easy to navigate. we have spent a ton of time on the combat mechanics portion so far, and we are really happy with it! we'd like to expand it significantly, and make it more comprehensive and well organised as well.

the "progression" section on the guide is meant as a guide for us, to play the game in a complete way like Chuggaconroy's lets plays. We've done this before about two years ago; we started the game over after having considerable understanding of everything in the game, which let us plan out a route to play in the most fun ways!

we loved this playthrough! we've also done something similar with xenoblade 1: when the xenoblade 1 remaster came out for switch, we had our same friend come over and watch us and talk about the game with us. we wanted to create our own builds and playstyles and interact with all the mechanics as much as possible, and we could do this because our collective game knowledge between us and our friend gave us comprehensive information and know how! we also loved this playthrough.

when we've been watching this friend play xenoblade x, we've been able to recall all the things we know about the game to help her out!

xenoblade x is somewhat inaccessible to play, and all of the information is isolated and in inconvenient locations, if any at all!

we want her to have a good time with the game!

watching her play has made us think about some of things we like about the game and some things we would change, and things we would like to write about. we have no intention of actually writing any more for our guide, but we definitely will if we want to some day! that's healthy for us.

because of the scale of xenoblade x, it is very difficult to actually record all of our thoughts for it. it is pretty comforting being able to do that though!

we absolutely love talking about it and the xeno series in general with her. it makes us so happy! we also love that she gets to play it. she has played xenoblade 1 before and has watched Chuggaconroy's comprehensive lets play series for xenoblade 2, so we get to talk about so many things, in a lot of detail!

elma

we have ALSO begun thinking about how elma, the main character of xenoblade x, could be implemented in smash bros..

we want a core theme for the character, and work with that in mind.

elma's class in xenoblade x is full metal jaguar, which is designed like a glass cannon. she likes killing people quickly and not getting hit!

in xenoblade x, you can change what weapons you use for auto attacks, and these build tension! building tension is almost always done by attacking.

these together make us think elma should be a rushdown combo character! they have comboey normals and TP arts for kill moves on specials, and maybe overdrive if they have a lot of tension! overdrive would expand combo routes probably.

webhome ideas

recently, we've expanded our photography page on our site quite a lot! and think it and pretty picture making in general are a special interest, confidently now.

we've started making a page to record books we've read, and also a page for trains. we think we'd like to make the train page about stories and rolling stock! we aren't fully sure yet. we like sharing photographs we take in-context to something else, rather than an isolated album! this is why we haven't made a photography album. and train page lets us do that! transit pictures are some of our favourites too.

in a similar way to photographs, we want to create a directory for drawings we've down. drawing is usually a form of expression for us, and generally we are very proud of our drawings and want to share them! there are some copyright related reasons for not beginning work on the page yet, and because we also think we'd like to keep our drawings private for now in general.

we'd like to make a page for games, similar to books we've read. we have written a very long document about fire emblem conquest that we could adapt to a webpage! fire emblem conquest is very very good. a games page sounds like a very fun way to talk about and collect our thoughts for things we're interested in.

we also really really want to do more coding style shit! like, css and html stuff. we have prioritised making documents rather than presentation because we've found that when we originally made our website, publishing pages gives us more ideas and desire to make it pretty and fun to use!

we really love our website, and the expression and activities it gives us. it makes our brain really happy and is very healthy to engage with! it is is ours.

we're thinkking a lot about a site map, since our site is not statically generated. it would mean we woudn't need to update common elements like nav on every webpage when we want to link to a new page!!

we really like making custom css and presentation for new pages and think it is super fun. want to do this more!!!

we love our website so much.

self harm

we have been having negative feedback loop thoughts a lot recently! this makes it difficult to do self care and makes doing self harm actively much more accessible, and almost guranteed.

especially physical self harm! it is ambiguous in that we like it in some ways, but we know that it is not healthy for us to do! our website's main background has a drawing of fresh cuts on a arm, because it makes us happy.

being aware that we have a negative feedback loop and that is why we are defaulting to self harm mentally and physically a lot is really good! we have acknowledged it is happening and can help feel better and be healthier. it makes it less overwhelming!

taking care of ourselves is really important to us, and understanding feelings like this is a huge part of how we are able to take care of ourselves! reminding ourselves of healthy care strategies, telling us that our insecurities are unfounded and are okay, learning where feelings come from to feel better! encouraging ourselves to do self care takes spoons, and positive feedback loop helps a lot. we've been talking about and being mindful about our feelings to try and have spoons and know what we can do, and then doing our best to actively notice when we have negative feedback loop and trying to consiously make it positive instead, and doing something that is healthy for us instead!

we like making our words accessible and happy and accessible and inclusive and suportive.