So I think I figured out what my ideal Stand would
be.
[STAND
MASTER] Voltech
Power: C
Speed: E
Range: B
Durability: C
Precision: A
Potential: B
Appearance-wise, Gamma Ray is a gaunt, birdlike
Stand with a mechanical affect. Even
though it looks like it wears light armor, the plates are mostly for show;
fortunately, that means it’s not weighed down by any extra metal. Through the various slits in its armor, Gamma
Ray is capable of generating small sheets of paper to be used liberally.
Gamma Ray is a Stand that gives priority to its
special abilities and range instead of raw, direct offense. When fought up close, its stats aren’t much
more than the average person, and its speed leaves a lot to be desired. By working in tandem with Voltech, however,
Gamma Ray’s true potential can be unlocked.
The paper generated organizes into “Paper Rings”, which can be set at
various points in an area (in a wide range, but only places where it or the
user has/had line of sight).
These Paper Rings take on an effect that matches
whatever Voltech has “written” on them; the words inscribed are generated
through psychic concentration, which is usually done by running a pencil
through the air (for fast but weak action), on actual materials like paper or
the ground (for slower but stronger activation), or via keyboards/typewriters
(for the slowest but strongest effects).
Anything that passes through one of Gamma Ray’s
Paper Rings takes on the properties written down. For example, if Voltech writes “Boost”
(and/or a string of related words) and then tosses a quarter through the Ring,
then its velocity will increase dramatically.
The potency of each Ring depends on the quality of the words written and
the means by which they were made.
Writing a couple of words via pencil creates a “Level 1” Ring, which
would send a quarter through at three times its normal speed. Writing pages of concentrated content via
keyboard would make a Level 5 Ring, which would send that same quarter through
at 20 times its normal speed.
Voltech and Gamma Ray alike can make use of the
Rings, just as objects, animals, people, and other Stands can; for example,
placing a string of boost Rings can send them over long distances at high
speeds, or even simulate flight (so long as enough rings are placed in
advance/on the go). However, there are
at least three main limits to the ability.
First: the Rings only hold out (in strength or number) as long as
Voltech’s stamina and concentration do; placing too many Rings means he’ll burn
through all of his energy. Second: the
Stand’s nature makes it much better-suited for long-range operations; being
caught off-guard or forced into a close-range fight puts Gamma Ray at a big
disadvantage. Third: the potential words
Voltech can write are limited by his diction, style, and (nonsensical) preferences. He can’t outright kill someone with a Ring
labeled “dead”, for example, because it “just isn’t cool enough”. In exchange, the potential for improvement --
through gaining knowledge/learning more words -- is decidedly high.
By setting up and making use of Paper Rings,
Voltech and Gamma Ray can compensate for their lack of raw combat ability with
enhanced and unpredictable abilities.
When working together, the two of them can make use of their primary
special attack, “The Spirit”. After
setting a “pierce” Paper Ring ahead of them, Voltech thrusts forward -- with a
pencil, or simply a fist -- while Gamma Ray backs him up with a flurry of paper
sheets. As they pass through the Ring,
their basic attack becomes a lance with impressive range and force -- and the
overall effect increases depending on the level/number of Rings used.
…
…Well, there you go. That’d be my ideal Stand. And now that that’s out of the way, I’ve
decided to go on a sort of, but not really, hiatus.
Don’t worry.
It’s not as if I’m dying or anything (as far as I know). It’s just that…well, I’ve been thinking about
stuff. I like blogging, because it lets
me organize my thoughts and share them with others -- “others” being a
subjective term by virtue of my non-popularity, but you get the idea. I like it when people comment on my stuff,
because it implies that I’ve had some perceptible (and hopefully beneficial)
effect on them. I doubt I’ve rocked
anyone’s world, but if I did something to brighten someone’s day, then that’s a
small victory in my book.
The problem is that I don’t want to just gnaw on
the corners of “small victories” forever.
I want to do more. Much more. I can think of several things I want to get
done with this blog (and beyond) in less time than it takes to say “Plan B”. That’s the blogger’s curse, I suppose; gotta
keep pumping out content, but you’ve gotta do all this admin stuff to keep the
blog going -- and when you finish that (if you finish), you’ve gotta pump out
even more content.
Speaking personally? I want to do an overhaul of Cross-Up. But in order to do that -- at least to the
level of artistry I’m after -- I need to put some time into a side project of
mine. And I haven’t, obviously; if I
had, you would’ve seen the changes by now.
And I want to put some real work into my Patreon campaign, because that’s
basically been languishing since its inception.
And I need to spread my online presence through social media and sites
like TV Tropes (to be fair I’ve taken steps, but I’ve slipped over the months). And I need to put work into the subreddit I
made, and the Pinterest page I made, and the DeviantArt account I made. Like, did you even know I had those? Probably not, and that’s the problem.
And the problems only get compounded from
there. It’s safe to assume that Cross-Up
is more or less a gaming blog, even though other stuff crops up here on a
regular basis. So in order to write
about games, I need to play games -- and holy shit, I am drowning in games right now.
The 2016 holiday season is beyond relentless, thanks in part to the
delays that have pushed everything into a release window the size of a lima
bean. I tried to clear up every JRPG I’ve
got (and failed; sorry, Tokyo Mirage Sessions) so I could start Final Fantasy 15 in earnest/without distraction…yet as of this
post, I’m still working my way
through Tales of Zestiria. But I’m close to beating Tales -- only to realize that The
Last Guardian was dropping from orbit.
And then Let it Die suddenly
materializes out of the ether. And I
guess I owe it to myself to see if Watch
Dogs 2 is an improvement over its predecessor, because I’m dumb and hate
myself.
I guess what I’m getting at here is that I need
time, and I already burned through it via massive undertakings like Xenoblade Chronicles X, Tales of Zestiria, and four separate
(misery-inducing) Uncharted games. As much as I hate to admit it, it’s probably
not a stretch to assume that I’m burnt out in general. Playing through Uncharted, for example, made me realize the lines between playing
for fun, playing to learn (and teach) something new, and playing out of sheer
obligation. Some days, it feels like I’ve
completely ignored doing that first one -- you know, the thing that should be the top priority.
And I don’t just want to stick to games. I’ve got anime that I want to watch. There are some movies I could stand to give a
look. The last time I touched anything
on Netflix was when I watched Daredevil…Season
1…Episode
4. Various TV shows still elude
me, and I want to give some of them a look; I’ve always wanted to watch Mad Men and fawn over the
nigh-unrivaled majesty of Christina Hendricks see what all the noise is (or
was) about. And you don’t know how many
books I’ve got tucked under my bed -- some of which, I presume, have dog vomit
on them.
Also, memo to self: get a hold of Atlas
Obscura.
The biggest reason that I’m calling for a hiatus,
though, is because I want to put some real work into fulfilling that
oft-mentioned dream of being a writing hero -- and as much as I can type in a
sitting or two, it’s kind of hard to accomplish anything on the dream front
when you’re committing 15,000+ words to explaining why Uncharted 4 is a fresh plate of roadkill stuffed with tripe,
licorice, and set on fire. And right now…well,
I kind of want more time to work on fiction stuff, because I have a couple of
major endeavors in mind.
You can probably guess what one of them is if you’ve
ever looked up at the blog’s header. And
yeah, I’ve got plans to work on that in a major way -- but since working on
that means more than just typing stuff, it'l’ take a lot more preparation and
focus. The more reasonable project (such
as it is) is more of a one-shot thing that a smart person would’ve made in the
first place, but I think the fact that I have
come up with something is worth getting excited about. And I am
excited about it, no question. I
hope I can put time into it, finish, push it out there, and have some good come
of it instead of a grand buffet of nothing.
I guess in the end, I’m not much more than a
selfish glutton. Only instead of
devouring as much food as humanly possible, I’d rather hoard and gorge on art in
its myriad forms. It’s a wide world,
after all, and if I can’t go on an endless quest from one corner of the planet
to another (and/or space), then I’ll travel vicariously through the thousands
of stories drifting through the world.
And on top of that, I want to know what others have done, so that I can
learn something -- and learn how to better push my stories out there.
Let me be 100% clear, though: no, this is not the
end of Cross-Up. And more pressingly:
no, anyone who actually reads this blog will not suddenly be deprived of
content. I’ve been working towards just
this scenario for a while now, after all.
I’m not going to suddenly stop uploading stuff (even if that’d be even
more beneficial for the cause), but I am going to scale back. Since I’m pretty sure I’m comparatively
putting out several times more content than other bloggers (if we’re going by
word count, at a bare minimum), then I’d expect that those who want stuff from
me will still be satisfied if I only release one post a week instead of two.
What am I uploading? Well…
Yep. I’ve
made some huge progress with JoJo,
and I’m going to push out posts that talk about each of its parts. It’s a safe bet that each installment -- in Phantom Blood, Battle Tendency, Stardust
Crusaders, and Diamond is Unbreakable
-- will each take two posts to go
through. As such? I’d wager that by the time I get through
them, I’ll be refreshed and ready to write it out. I hope nobody will mind (or get fatigued by)
what might as well be two straight months of JoJo…BUT there’s a caveat worth mentioning.
I’m committed to scaling back for a bit, yes. However, I’m not committed to the exact time
frame for it. That is, I’m not going to
give a hardline date when I’ll suddenly say “I’M BACK” and write in earnest for
the blog. Nor am I going to say that you’ll
only get one post a week and nothing else.
I reserve the right to toss up a post if I’m feeling particularly struck
by a bolt of inspiration -- like if I go and see Rogue One, for example. More
pressingly? Since I’m pretty sure that’s
the one thing people expect out of me -- and its cousin was basically the
catalyst for this entire blog -- you bet your sweet bippy that I’m going to
write something about Final Fantasy 15 sooner
or later. That probably won’t be
uploaded until next month, though; I want to put serious time into the game before I say anything, because I
haven’t forgotten what happened last time.
And that’s pretty much what I’ve got for now. That’s my plan, as rough as it is. Even now there are still posts I want to
write (I’ve got a Word document that tells me I need to write something about
the Power Rangers), but I know that now’s not the best time. There are things that I want to do and need
to do, and as much as I enjoy writing these posts, I know that there are times
when it’s had me wrapped in chains instead of free to express myself. As backwards as it sounds, maybe the best way
to enhance the writing for this blog is to (however temporarily and
incompletely) stop writing for this blog.
I mean, I’ve got close to 800 posts at this
point. You guys aren’t going to be starved
for content.
But yeah, I do think it’s time for me to ease up a
little bit. This is technically the
holiday season, after all, and people are probably winding down as the
temperature drops. Maybe I should follow
suit. In the 5-ish years that I’ve been
working on Cross-Up, I’ve only skimped on regular updates just over a half-dozen
times -- and most of those only happened so I could deal with deaths in the
family. Not to be that guy, but I think I could stand to have a little break. Recharge, refocus, revive, redirect,
whatever; something tells me that it can only be good in the long run.
And that’ll do it for now. See you guys next time. Thanks for reading, be sure to tell all your
friends about this blog, and -- in case I don’t get the chance by virtue of
getting to into my JoJo posts -- Happy Holidays.
…But man.
How about that BITES THE DUST, huh?
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