LittleBLUDragoness

So let me just officially make it clear: I am not going to be checking my DA as diligently and renders from me will be very few and far between until I'm revived come springtime.

To the surprise of nobody, I was informed that Pinkolol decided to talk about me to Fission and the rest of her "higher up" friends. Later, they started talking shit behind my back, including Pinkolol continuing to rant about my last reply to her before she blocked me. As if the fact that she blocked me wasn't enough she went ahead and continued to rant in a server/group chat/wherever that I have no access to.

But enough stooping to their level by being a gossipy hen, I come with a grim reminder. And a warning.

Anybody remember back in April when Tomato127 deactivated her DeviantArt account? (Obviously, it's back up now.)
That memory was brought back to the surface when I was suddenly invited to a group chat without anyone telling me they planned to do so. I only saw three people in the group chat before the combination of names clicked in my head and my response was an immediate
The three names I saw were Pinkolol, Fission, and Zeldaboy. I happen to know two of the three that I named were just a few of the individuals in that group chat mobbing that scared Tomato into deactivating her account back then, so can anyone blame me for not exactly feeling safe in that circumstance?
My major reason for writing this Journal is to warn anyone that if you see these three individuals in a group chat you were randomly pulled into: Escape! They will invite more people into the chat and mob you, give you no chance to speak or defend yourself! Tomato even told me she tried to invite a friend to help her and they kicked her friend from the group chat immediately!

To the three of you: I am still willing to talk, but I will not budge on my condition that we speak in an open place. My DA profile, or no deal.

When I first joined the "community", starting out on GMod, it felt exciting to know that I could put the characters I've made, and the stories I came up with, to good use since I don't have a scanner and I didn't have a tablet at the time. That I could find others who are as passionate as myself and whom I could share Friend Codes and headcanons and ideas with! I did find a group of people I could call my true friends, but not before stumbling across a lot of shady things...

I'm not sure how much Anti-Inkling has affected the Splatoon Source "community" but I can't help but feel that they left a negative impact that even to this day plagues the "community". The recurring trend in the "community" is that I appear to be in the minority when it comes to people with a sense of passion for their preferred subject, the subject being Splatoon. Anti-Inkling, as far as my investigating and happenstance discoveries have uncovered, was essentially a cringe culture group that grew a little too big. I mention this because I remember posting a comment or two saying how I feel there's a prevailing air of cringe culture in the "community", and from my research into cringe culture I've concluded that they're a bunch of trolls who figured out if they could claim their bullying was "criticism" they could get away with bullying others, especially NSFW artists, even if they have to dig up the porn from their well hidden and appropriately tagged places, and most damning of all; newbies and children. Nobody starts off being an expert at anything, we have to grow and develop our skills. We also all have a cringey phase when we're young, some just don't grow out of it as quickly as others. Bullying "cringey" newbies and children doesn't encourage them to improve, it only makes them want to quit, which means whatever creative potential they had is forever lost, or you invoke reverse psychology and make them continue their behavior and it takes longer for them to want to improve. This is partly also why criticism has such a negative connotation nowadays, on top of some people having fragile egos.

Cringe culture also inherently has an elitist mindset to it, giving those who engage in it to think themselves superior to those that they mock, all without realizing that they essentially kill their own creative passion. Among all who I've determined as elitists in the "community" I've noticed the recurring trend of them never making any art that, while looking good in the moment, is memorable for any length of time beyond a few minutes. The sad thing about group mentality is that those who set themselves on the highest rung of the popularity ladder, whether they intended to or not, become the "standard" for their community and the Splatoon Source "community" was no exception. I know Sturgeon's Law dictates 90% of things you encounter would be bad, but I don't really see Sturgeon's Law in the "community", I just see blandness. Call me daft, but I'd rather see more bad art with actual heart put into it than all this mediocrity, because at least a bad artist who has the passion and drive to want to improve will attempt to do so as opposed to someone who already thinks they've hit their pinnacle and basks in the attention their mediocrity brings.

Not that it would be easy to try and push past all this blandness because said elitists have also held the passionate in a creative chokehold. They set themselves up as the sole porting team of the "community" and then claim they'll release their models, but nowadays (Hell, back since before 2018 even!) they have not released anything of substantial merit. The Salmonid look awful in Source, Off the Hook are nowhere near the quality of the Squid Sisters, the Splatoon 2 Squid Sisters are nice but not what we really need, and we're still stuck having to use Inklings as Octolings. And yet the elitists claim that they'll share their stuff eventually, to remain patient, all while they make no effort to hide the fact that they are using their models in their own art. Just as shiftily as trolls claiming to be doing good, they claim all the art they make featuring unreleased models is all to showcase them, to preview them, when at this point we should know better that they are simply showing off. There was a point where the elitists' words could be trusted because they did used to share, now they are just lying and continuing to believe them would be nothing more than naivety or even willful ignorance.

But the thing I want to share with you all the most is just how truly dangerous the elitism has become: Team Downfall. Word on the grapevine says they formed shortly before Anti-Inkling's downfall as a second base of operations for those who still carry the Anti-Inkling spirit but this is just a rumor, but one I wouldn't be surprised to discover as being true. Consider the following: Many of Anti-Inkling's members targeted Heavy. Lolattack, one of two people who made a video on Heavy, then founds Team Downfall. Just saying it's quite suspicious to me. But whether or not they have a connection to Anti-Inkling is not where the real danger comes in, it is how mercilessly they harass and bully their chosen victims. They may open their videos with messages to not harass people, but this is the internet so of course they attack the individuals anyway. If that wasn't bad enough they continued to further mock Ellie even after making their point, there was no reason for them to make the additional videos that they did other than to gain a sick sense of joy from the suffering of another. Whether or not Ellie's actions were right doesn't excuse the mistreatment that followed her afterwards, she's still a human being. Every time I see people saying anything along the lines of "Team Downfall should make a video on this person", I become a little more misanthropic because nobody understands the ramifications of Team Downfall's existence. We're being watched, by the elitists no less. They know the power they wield over their audience and, at the snap of a finger, any one of us could become the next chew toy. But if this threat of attack, this feeling of never being safe again, wasn't bad enough the real kicker is that when the day comes that I hear one of Team Downfall's victims has committed suicide I know I won't be surprised.

Suicide is an epidemic worldwide and people like the bullies behind Team Downfall do not help! The old saying of "sticks and stones" has since been refuted by science, a person's physical well-being is closely linked to their mental and emotional health. A broken heart, extreme fright, prolonged stress, these have been recorded as being linked to conditions such as depression but it can get worse. A prolonged negative emotional state can cause certain deaths either by heart failure, encouraging risky behavior, and of course, suicide. Words hurt, we can't deny this. Team Downfall would not be the first internet bullies to lead to someone's death and they would not be the last. I know what you're thinking, "Nobody's died because of Team Downfall", but why risk it? To the members of Team Downfall, whom I'm sure couldn't give two rats' asses about what I have to say but, stop this before you go too far! All this bullshit you've brought up into the public eye could have been resolved better via a private intervention. There was no need for any of this to be made public, to have painted such a vivid target on anyone's backs, no matter how much you think they deserve it! You may not be able to see their real faces but they are still real people on the other side of your connection, and you are hurting them!

With all this bullshit going on it is now time to reveal what I have been up to since the last time I said anything on DA. First: I was contacted by the original creator of the Too Many Eye Colors, 130+ Hairbands, and Enhanced Eyelashes packs and not only have I been given permission to reupload the packs but that ownership of the packs has been transferred to me. I am aware of Ramin (Steam username) having reuploaded the packs for GMod but I intend to make my own uploads anyway, I'll just request that Ramin remove his upload once mine are up since in the event of new Inkling (and Octoling) models being released I would be more than happy to make either an update or make second versions of the existing textures to support the new models.

Once I've finished with Workshop stuff I am happily returning to the thing that has truly occupied my time for much of August: Blender. SFM, I hardly knew ye, but I intend to make Blender my new main medium because Source is just too limiting to me. It's old, SFM is unstable, map porting's a bitch, and of course, lack of materials to work with i.e. maps and models. I intend to port to Source, even if it all seems a bit daunting to me, but I've been suppressed by the elitists for too long. Additionally, as much as I would be more than happy to completely ditch this cod forsaken excuse of a "community", I cannot. I have friends here, good friends, great people who have stuck by my side and care about me. We shared laughs, good times, and tears together, how could I abandon them? I would also be remiss if I didn't mention that, while not being friends of mine, I see there are others who share our creative passion and to leave them suffocating under this feeling of being stifled is not something I would wish upon anyone with a spirit like that. Let me make one thing absolutely clear right away: When I get to porting I will be doing so prioritizing what I want to port while also taking requests from friends, I am only sharing what I port because of kindness, not obligation. Of course, I cannot promise my first port will be super amazing or anything, but I will strive to improve. Criticism will be welcome as long as you tell me what I did right, what I did wrong, and where I can improve.

And to those you who have read all the way to this point without throwing the "Too long; Didn't read" towel: I give my most sincere thank you. And an additional message.
Pick up Blender. If you want true creative freedom then what could be better than a program that not only lets you pose, animate, and render, but even create in-engine? Create from scratch, edit something preexisting, even just make a minor change. You ever felt bothered by lack of maps in SFM or maybe overwhelmed by the number of maps in GMod? Make your own map from scratch and decorate as you please, whether it's a simple scene build or the beginnings of a map you reuse. Make your own characters from scratch! Best of all, if you still want to work with Splatoon models there's plenty you can pick up via Tomato127's porting tutorial. Speaking of the tutorial, if you don't want to move to Blender then I still recommend that you pick up Blender anyway and try porting for yourself. All this chaos with Fission and his cohorts have only taught me that popularity should not award any person free pass if they behave poorly and that if you see signs of trouble you shouldn't stay silent or inactive. Speak up! Take action! Whether you choose to share your ports or not, just don't stay creatively stagnant. I know it may seem like porting is hard, especially with the scarcity of reliable porting teachers and mentors, but the tutorial is a good start. Plus, I've been assured it's not as hard as it seems. Just from my testing and screwing around with Tomato's script I've been able to load plenty of models into Blender, and while I'm aware some may need manual fixing due to the script's incomplete state, it works. Just the fact that you don't need 3DS Max in order to port, there is no paywall or a need to sacrifice your squeaky clean (non-)criminal record, is already enough for me to celebrate this script's existence and how it offers a way out of elitist control. My only lament is that I had to give this message too soon to reliably offer porting help myself but you should be able to glean something valuable via Tomato's tutorial and Google research, and if all else fails, it doesn't hurt to ask me a question or two anyway. Before you jump into Blender and porting I do recommend watching (YouTube username) Blender Guru's videos on how to use Blender, especially his Beginner's Guide. So what will it be; continue to wait and hope for the long overdue, or take action?

Here's a thought that randomly came to me as I thought about the fact that Splatoon 2 is a year old now and how the dev team did keep track of the passage of time between the first and second games.

I recall coming across a Japanese tweet that, when translated, confirmed the Squid Sisters as 17 years old. This was back in the first game, so as of Splatoon 2 the two cousins are legal in the US presumably 19 years old at the beginning of Splatoon 2. :bademoticon: 

(TANGENT ALERT: Which I guess lessens the fact that I'm sure people drooled over Callie when she dressed like a hooker but... Why would DJ Octavio have her wear such an outfit? Let's not forget the fact that he surrounds himself with female Octoling warriors who are also dressed with armor of "questionable functionality"...)

Speaking of idols, another Japanese tweet revealed the ages of our new hostesses, Off the Hook. That had a surprise reveal! According to the tweet Marina was 18 years old and, despite her smaller size, Pearl is the senior of the duo at 21. :bademoticon: :bademoticon:
I know I amuse easily, but Pearl is the oldest female character in the series now despite also being the shortest Inkling as well!

Speaking of oldest characters, let's move on to Cap'n Cuttlefish and DJ Octavio. What are they doing to live for so damn long? In the first Splatoon you could find a Sunken Scroll that depicts a younger Cap'n Cuttlefish and another scroll that shows a younger Cap'n with who appears to be a younger DJ Octavio. That previous scroll I mentioned was also a picture taken during the Great Turf War which, in-game lore states, happened 100 years prior...
These old dudes are 100+ years old. By the beginning of Splatoon 2 they are 102+ years old. I say "+" because we don't know how old they were when they fought in the Great Turf War but that adds additional decades into their age.

Moving on from cephalopods that are giving immortal jellyfish a run for their nematocysts, let's talk about the player characters, including three in particular. In Splatoon 1 the Inklings we see in the Plaza, and the one we consequently play as, are around 14 years old. This is the age in which Inklings have matured enough to gain the ability to shapeshift between their humanoid and squid forms. In Splatoon 2 we take control of a new squidkid when we start the game and the Square is supposedly dominated by a new "generation" (not that I doubt there would be at least some veterans thanks to a certain squidkid's reappearance as of the Octo Expansion). It has also been confirmed that the Octolings we take control of are younger than the opposing Octolings we face in Octo Valley, Octo Canyon, and in the Deepsea Metro so the Octolings we see walking around in Inkopolis are likely around the same age as their Inkling peers. This would make Agents 4 and 8 around 14 years old and Agent 3 was around 16...    

Note the "was".

If the dev team plans to continue keeping track of time the way that they have then the Squid vs Octopus Splatfest officially adds another year onto our cast's ages! Cap'n Cuttlefish and DJ Octavio continue to spit on the grim reaper's face for another year, Marina is now 19 years old, Callie and Marie are 20, Pearl is 22, our current protagonists, Agent 4 and 8, are now around 15, and Agent 3 is now around 17 years old.
Agent 3 is now most likely as old as the Squid Sisters were back in Splatoon 1. Who'd like to see them make a return in a future game, maybe even with the option to customize them like in the Octo Expansion?... That may be wishful thinking.