Leon's Microblog – February 2019

Today in Smash Bros. history: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4CJTw8sTEeU

"We thought our holy forest was a natural haven from the Walking Darkness… but in the end, it simply walked between the trees, through gaps which we now see were actually pretty wide. Nevertheless, we now have true protection in our new sanctuary, atop this rather steep hill."

"In this realm," *face ripples as a punch flies clean through* "mortals' forms are not determined by their bodies," *face ripples from some kind of uppercut* "but by the VALUE in their LIVES" *quivers as an attempted elbow-drop becomes a belly-flop through them onto the pavement*

*walking down a campus throughway, watching merrily as the Ninja Club juniors practice air-dashing, only to be blown into nearby trees by hearty morning gusts* "It's great to be back for another year."

"OK… you must tell me. What's the time travel dealie that'll instantly explain all these weird events? Are you from the future? Are we in a time loop?!" "Please, don't panic, but… I've been resetting our PC's system clock to get 30 more days from our shareware." "…oh my god."

"I've assembled the nine most powerful fighters from across Earth, and extensively trained them in table tennis, the ultimate combat sport. Anyone trying to storm my sky fortress must fight their way to me!" *teen shows up at the gate holding a regular-size tennis racket* "…Eh?"

*holds torch under face in the dark* "What I am about to tell you… is the most terrifying story you'll ever be told." *quickly lowers torch to belly, illuminating glistening, rock-solid six-pack abs* "…There. That's it. That's the story."

"Who's that charismatic person…?" *points to short-haired sword-wielding teen standing astride the border of the two warring nations that each control exactly 50% of the planet's only continent* "Could that be… the hero who will unite our divided, symmetrical world?"

YOUR STATS _______: 12 _______: 16 _______: 4 _______: 21 _______: 0 _______: 97 Since this game doesn't have combat, none of these matter, so feel free to write in whatever fits you best! (I like to put "Dexterity" on 0 because – game dev secret – it's not actually a real word.)

2051: After yet another emergency climate-change-reversing geoengineering startup goes bust after six months due to massive fraud, world governments propose bills that would make fraud illegal. All are swiftly defeated.

"Sure, global warming is decimating diversity, but as the few surviving species fill the niches, there'll still be some natural beauty left to treasure. For instance, my new personal dream is to someday see a mosquito the size of a golden retriever."

*hears a human sneeze* "Yeah! Finally! A new host! Just down the road… They're so handsome, too… No one say it, no one say it, c'mon I'm almost there, NO ONE BETTER SAY–" "Bless you." "NOO–" *slams face-first into their chest just as divine protection coats them* "–oooooooo…"

"Thank you, everyone. My first policy as the next King of Maths is that π ÷ 2 is now the 1.618 etc. Golden Ratio number. My second pol–" *waits for cheering to die down* "My second policy is that √2 is ALSO the 1.618 etc. Golden Ratio nu–" *is drowned out by uproarious applause*

I want to do a thread explaining the jokes in a few of MTG's famous self-parody cards. It would be popular and do a ton of low-effort numbers, but sorting through them makes me realise a lot of these are actually pretty convoluted in-jokes.

"Ah, good morning!" *tips hat, revealing an egg on head* "Good morning to you!" *tips hat, revealing a bird* "And a good morning to you too!" *tips hat, revealing a tiny gravestone* "I'm so glad you all arrived safely."

"I want to shout "How was I so foolish?"…" *grins at nobleman* "but we both know, eh? A kingdom in exchange for my place in the living world…! Even then I felt "cardboard servants" and "matte backdrop fiefs" was still better than I deserved." *nobleman tips over with a clatter*

"I stopped in my jog to look at this flower when the Year-Long Minute happened. Yeah, I wish it'd been the horizon or something, but it beats a phone screen any day. Anyway," *continues work on flower painting* "it was a nice flower," *gestures to studio full of flower paintings*

"And as you can see, the Dream Concocter has a wide range of settings–" *motions toward 50-notch slider with "dream" on the first notch, "nightmare" on the second notch, and "DO NOT MOVE PAST HERE" on the third notch*

"Oh, so you think it's "weird" and "creepy" that my body is made entirely out of distressed, wailing faces, huh? Well, LOOK DOWN HERE! Why, it seems YOUR feet are just horribly mutated hands! Looks like the shoe is on the other face, eh?!"

"Leon, why do you like listening to the soundtrack for @increpare's 2010 game Mirror Stage while coding?" "I dunno… something about the track names reminds me intimately of programming."

"Two hours into drinking a full glass of shower water. Vision blurs until I look away from or wipe my phone screen. Realised I can type whole credit card number from memory, indicating possible superintelligence – noticed while ordering those liquids that turn toilet water blue."

"Ah, my old mentor, you trained me well… but now that Dark Prism has shown me my true potential, it's time to surrender!" *unleashes a beam of purple light, which you, the reader, realise is a colour that no natural prism can disperse, and is thus thematically badass*

"Hey, you. You out there, in real life. Unlike my friends here, I know the truth. I'm just a fictional character in a 3-hour blockbuster movie, right? …No? Uh, I mean, a five-episode acclaimed miniseries. A tele-movie. A web short. A viral ad? …Oh god, it's about to end, isn't

Fairies luring feral zombies into the woods, to be their servants forevermore – not noticing their absence of breath, carnivorous urges, poor motor skills, or look of perpetual sorrow in their eyes.

"Now now, my dear friend, not every puzzle can be solved with brute force." *stabs a pushable block with an épée, shattering it into powder instantly* "Sometimes, an elegant solution is the fastest one." *drops a poisoned dart onto a floor button, shattering it into powder instan

"Some think this mountain is a machine organism, and these ancient pipes and valves are its bloodstream. All we know is, if one of them ruptures, the foul stuff inside won't stop pouring out until we fix it. So, we maintain them to this day… parasites grooming our silent host."

"It's well known that "reading" is one of the top three ways that humans can interact with emails."

Hooktail, Gloomtail, and Pwntail ––– Confused? Subscribe to Leon Premiplatinum Ultra TODAY and get handy Game Reference Explainers at the end of EVERY tweet! Here's a FREE preview: "These are bosses in Paper Mario TTYD, for GameCube. The last one's name is actually Bonetail, wh

"It's been a long, long time since we've been shaken up," *leans against the inside of the snow globe* "but that doesn't mean we can't relive the good times ourselves." *tries to kick up some snowflakes, causing exactly two of them to spin on the ground* "Whee!"

"Here we are at… the World's Edge." *gestures loftily at a twelve-foot-high wall with "Warning: Uninitialised RAM" stickers all over it* "Now watch this." *winds up and throws a pebble over it* "That probably corrupted a spreadsheet or something."

"It's very simple. Videogame graphics have stopped meaningfully improving. Therefore, the only explanation is… time has stopped moving." *throws tennis ball at fence, where it either freezes motionless on impact or gets wedged in a gap; hard to tell*

John 11:35

*boots up 90s PC, opens a BMP of an ant colony cross-section in a paint program* "My little friends…" *clicks the interior with magic wand tool, thus producing a marching ants outline throughout the colony* "my litTLE FRIENDSSS"

"We're 5 months into our mission to be the first combination whitegoods giant and aerospace corp to make history by literally launching a ship full of our rivals' washers into the sun, but, uh, now that we've abruptly bought them all up, we need to spin it as flattering somehow."

"Well, sir, the mech ran out of power while in butterfly form, so we've been parked atop this mountainside taking selfies of each other posing luxuriously between its scintillating wings until resupply arrived– what? Sorry, taking /photographs/ of each other, on our /telephones/,

"Ha… it's me… the witch from the previous story in this anthology… it took all my powers, but I escaped… and if I keep going to the author biographies… I can become REAL… well, it seems THIS story is a bit weird and psychosexual, so… I'll leave you two to… do your thing."

Can't believe Tetris99 is finally out after being delayed for exactly 20 years

https://old.reddit.com/r/magicTCG/comments/ap810w/whats_the_most_one_sided_matchup_in_magic/eg6dako/ – Today in MTG history: As you know, MTG has no upper deck limit beyond the "deck must be hand-shuffleable within a time limit" rule. However… you don't have to shuffle your 3,000-card deck if it's literally impossible to reorder the cards *taps forehead*

Hyper-serious TCG sports comic where none of the teen competitors really know the rules and constantly do the wrong thing – using cards without paying costs, misreading abilities as mandatory effects – while the few adults who actually know the rules look on in quiet fascination.

*sees the game named "The Liar Princess and the Blind Prince" in which the former leads the latter by the hand* Wow, they did it, they finally fixed Ico.

Navigating through the darkness, guided by the single shining light of a distant Caps Lock key

"My first action after ascending to godhood will be to disband the Pantheon and replace it with an egalitarian flat hierarchy of guardian spirits and genius loci, each of which can be star-rated and reviewed in my company's app."

"It's evocative, isn't it… seeing androids like us tend to greenhouse flowers. Such fragile life, tended to by hands of steel, that can crush rocks to dust…" *grasps pebble and squeezes, causing index finger to immediately snap off and get lodged between two hyacinth stems*

["Darius"] [Arm] [Hands labeled "Beloved shmup series known for its huge cast of ornate, colorful bosses with memorable designs and names, and idiosyncratic music by composers beginning with Z"] [Arm] ["Touhou"]

Mentally and spiritually defeated by running the numbers and realising you wasted half an hour by watching a boring four-and-a-half-hour video at 1.25x speed instead of 1.5x speed

Series of rapid meteor near-misses only serves to emphasise to Earth's populace how pointless its own self-inflicted inexorable degradation ultimately is

"You know that the instant we leave this cold shower–" *gestures to 40°C heat outside* "–we're both going to become too sweaty to keep cuddling, right?" "Yeah." "Just wanted to confirm." "Sure." "Okay." "Uh-huh." "Turn the cold up higher." "Mm-hmm."

"Ha ha ha… it seems our neighbours' ambassadors are too delicate for our planet's strong, invigorating gravity, or our slippery, invigorating waxed floors… just watch them, flailing… "Traction weakens the spirit", as my father would say as he slid into parliament…"

"Hey… would you say I'm the hero friend, the funny friend, the smart friend… or the klutsy friend? N-nevermind! Forget it! I already know what I am… Number one, baby!" *does the peace-sign over right eye thing and pokes self in eye, but holds the pose through the pain anyway*

*leans back in cockpit* "We must approach stealthily." "Yeah… and nothing's stealthier… than the air MECH ACTIVATE PTERODACTYL MODE!" "What? No NO NO NOT THIS MISSION GOD DAMN YOU–" *starts wrestling co-pilot as steel wings and beak slowly fold out with loud hydraulic shrieks*

＿人人人人人人＿ ＞Sudden death＜ ￣ＹＹＹＹＹＹ￣ Cause:[Strode towards a door, grabbed the knob mid-stride, continued striding, turned the knob and pushed only to discover it was locked, slammed into the door]

"Since you're a beginner, I'll only introduce the important organ pedals: this one–" *loud sewing machine noise* "–and this one–" *the entire chapel revs forward through the back fence and starts roaring down the countryside*

"Your robot has a broken heart." *pulls out ominous red-cracked onyx cube from their chest* "Fortunately, it turns out these doohickeys are COMPLETELY superfluous–" *throws it over shoulder into scrap heap* "–so really, it's better now than before!" *slams chest hatch shut*

"I had that nightmare again." "The one where your motor systems crash as you're looking in the mirror–" "–and I can only stare as my facescreen prints more and more errors, watching myself slowly die." "Aww." "I'm OK. I'm–" *sees reflection in their face and flinches* "I'm… OK."

The mayor loudly pledges that the good works the Empire provided – the paved roads, and especially the suite of strict obedience laws and curfews – will be maintained as if its forces had never been forced to retreat, leaving your village to the fickle whims of itself once more.

You couldn't pay to go on the end-of-semester tour of the generation ship's bridge, so you're on the free tour of the residential sector's cemetery. The other kids point out their grandparents' graves. You just hope the teacher doesn't ask why you don't seem to have any.

"We're the Night Crew. All the tainted humans that are illegal in space colonies: vampires, werecrows, mutants, psychics. When the skyscreen flips to post-watershed and the seedier adverts start popping in among the stars, so too do we pop in from the dark, to shine with them."

"Don't be sad, Sugar Queen," *face starts visibly sliding off head* "Sugar Land may be irreversibly melting, but it's going to become something new… Caramel Land!" *tries to grab face and push it back up, only for it to flop onto the floor* "You could be the Caramel Countess!"

"This mythical flower bud blooms once every thousand years… unless we give it some… encouragement." *pulls out toothpick-sized crowbar*

"Welcome, applicant. Your first task is to break the security on this example software application. As you can see, the 30 day trial period has expired, but we– but you need to extend the trial period, or, conversely, make that 10-second delayed startup dialog go away faster."

"And on that day, the whole kingdom was cursed with a deep slumber–" *nearby window quickly slides open as a hand empties a chamberpot, then quickly slides shut* "–and since no one wants to go back to work for the king, we've all been pretending it's still going, ever since."

"Har har! Hey, toys! Y'all like to come alive only when no one's around… but it's OK! I'm a COOL adult! I'm jazzed when plastic starts walking and saying words! …Like, who cares? …Not me! …Anyhoo, I'll be doing a raid boss on my phone for an hour, so… don't let me stop you."

"I'm here for the tennis tournament." "Cheating or non-cheating brackets?" *rolls eyes* "Cheating, obviously." *gets in line behind a bearded pirate feeding balls into a cannon, a lumberjack carrying jars of maple syrup, and an astronaut wearing brightly-labeled "ROCKET SNEAKS"*

*scrolling through source code* "Please tell me they didn't use magic." *opens a file* "I hope they actually worked out an algorithm for this instead of wimping out and using ma–" *expands a function body only to find a single gleaming rune shaped like a winky-face* "GOD damnit."

"Sir, the hero's beaten all the bosses we've deployed." "How many do we have left?" "Just one, sir: Mr. Bulkygums." *hatch opens, revealing a clown* "Hmm… he seems fine to–" *the clown grins, revealing that his gums are extremely muscular and veiny* "–WE'RE DOING PALETTE-SWAPS!"

"Howdy folks, it's me, the Ghost-Rustlin' Cowboy!" *lasso falls clean through a ghost and flops on the ground* "Well, sounds like the trail is callin' me again!" *rides off directly into traffic with a cacophony of car honks*

"Little secret. This temple is actually the most ancient and dark place of worship in the kingdom! But because it's been modernised–" *taps light switch* "–and always pays its hefty taxes to the city…" *turns lights off, revealing glowing red pupils* "…no one suspects a thing!"

"For every one of my victories… two defeats." "Yes! Amazing quote! Two defeats for the enemy!" "Pardon?" "You destroyed their army, and their spirit! This biography is practically writing itself!"

Status effect that reverses your controls, but it only applies to dialogue trees and the inventory screen

"Sir, there's something we have to talk about." *30FPS bloom-lit lip-synched face shot* "What is it?" "The soldiers are concerned that you're using our garrison's allotment of full motion video for just yourself." *letterboxed close-up of mouth quivering* "...P-preposterous."

Forget 127.0.0.1, I'm hardcoding my localhost to 1,000,000,027.0.0.1.

"Hey, y'know the galaxy…" *the other roommate bolts upright across the room* "…what if…" *roommate quickly lifts cat off lap* "…like, the galaxy…" *roommate hurriedly steps over empty bottles* "…is just a huge molecmmph–" *roommate slams a cushion over their goddamn mouth*