Prognostic

Place to share my thoughts on games or whatever I want to talk about. Mostly about Super Paper Mario at the moment...probably. — Main: PrimeJourney (Though I’ve only got one post on there.) You can call me Pancakenpie! Still figuring this Tumblr thing out.

[dietranch]

butterfly

[pancakenpie]

Ah, beautiful!

This is a really unique take on Tippi! I love the interpretation of her colors, especially on her main body—so fuzzy!

[spmcomic]

here’s a big old reference sheet for the blueberry!! 

this is how i draw him, along with some notes on details and the like. 

detailed bio under the cut:

Keep reading

[pancakenpie]

Ah...this is a very interesting take on his backstory.

I always had this feeling he hadn’t had the best life.

It makes his erratic and desperate behavior as the result of Timpani’s presumed death make more sense...

[paperizette]

Lady Timpani? :3

I have the same problem with timpani as i do with bow,,, i can’t decide on one design

[pancakenpie]

Oh, I love her design here...I can’t help but like the idea of her in a flowing white-rainbow dress...she looks pretty with pale green eyes and light brown hair, too!

[tribeofdarkness]

i think we tend to forget how morally gray of a character blumiere is

although it is true that he lost his mind after losing timpani and he ended up saving all worlds after being reunited with her, it still needs to be kept in mind that blumiere is still the main antagonist of super paper mario at the end of the day. i mean he literally tries to destroy all worlds for most of the game–sure, he felt regretful towards the notion, particularly nearing the mid point to the end of the game, but he was still trying to regardless. not to mention one of carson’s stories states that blumiere played upon o’chunks’s shame and depression after being betrayed by his advisors in the war to enlist him as a minion, and this is a rather darker side of bleck that’s kind of looked over.

i think this is one thing to be kept in mind during the entirety of my blog is to remember that bleck is not just a big softie of a man who misses his wife. he made some rather questionable–perhaps even bad, at that–decisions in his life. one thing that interests me the most about blumiere is how just morally gray he is of a character. he’s honestly probably one of the first examples i think of when i think of a morally gray character–one who makes good and bad decisions all at the same time.

[pancakenpie]

Yes! This is something I’ve been thinking about a lot in regards to his character.

As I’ve gotten older, I’ve started to realize how dark his whole intentions were. His backstory is greatly sympathetic and he does seem to not be a complete monster, but it is indeed true that what his plan was is akin to mass genocide. I hate using such a dark comparison...but he acts almost like a suicidal bomber: “if my life sucks then I’m taking everyone with me”.

It’s difficult, because he’s been one of my favorite characters in a story for a long time, but realizing this makes it a bit hard to find him sympathetic. But like tribeofdarkness said, perhaps it is this morally grey nature that makes him perhaps the most realistically dark portrayal of a villain within a happy-go-lucky Mario game. And maybe, the most haunting, as he represents what a real person could turn into.

I’ve often wondered what exactly pushed him to such a drastic scheme. In some ways, it might seem he’s a a horribly selfish man. And perhaps he is quite flawed...but it some ways he’s shown to be a kind person, even when he’s being wicked. Another point of sympathy is the fact he suffered such a great loss, being the death of his love, and no less, that she was murdered by his own father: I do think a person would be very much traumatized and broken from such an experience.

And yet, it is certainly no excuse for what he did. For one death, he tried to murder—no, erase—everyone and everything from existence. For someone who was described as loving the world very much (as described by Nastasia), this is a complete and extremely disturbing change.

In this way, I’ve often wondered if he has suffered a lot more to really push him over the edge. This is no way excusing him for his terrible choices, but his actions seem to show a great psychological turmoil that broke him as a person. I’ve often wondered if the Dark Prognosticus has something to do with it.

[floridianititio]

bleck (dad)

[pancakenpie]

Oh wow

This design is really amazing!

He exudes such personality! I can just feel that cold dignified yet cruel air from him...

I love those big shoulder-pads too!

[spmcomic]

This was introduced to me today. I have binged the entire series. And I'm hooked. Seeing an AU like this is amazing. It gives a backstory to an already shaky canon backstory. And seeing Dimentio at such a loss with traveling worlds is funny and endearing to me

ah, thank you…! that was a lot to read in one day, i’m glad you liked it so much! 

one of the fun things about spm is how little information you actually get, because it gives everyone so much freedom to put the puzzle pieces together however they like. mario only gets a brief encounter with this world and these characters, and the player is left to imagine what life would be like in this other faraway world. probably my favorite thing about this fandom is how everyone lets their imagination run wild and pulls all these distant threads together like a big conspiracy theory wall. and every combination is dramatically different.

i greatly enjoy portraying these characters as having no idea what they are doing. dimentio seems, to me, to be the kind of person who has to sprint directly into a wall multiple times in order to figure out there’s a wall there.

[pancakenpie]

Yes! Exactly! I love how the game leaves enough for you to fill in the details.

No wonder it stuck with me after all these years.

[spmcomic]

Merlon x Saffron? (from Garson's story about his love life)

ohohohooooo….

i know the two of them are old (or at least merlon is), so that “hard to get” sort of romance might be acceptable for the two of them. but garson says merlon pestered and pestered this poor woman until she broke down and gave him a near-impossible challenge. like, that’s her biggest dish. either she wanted him to prove himself, or she wanted him to fail and leave her the hell alone already. 

it could easily be the former! but i also know that merlon had only one sprig of parsley left on his plate, clearly intending to eat it- and even though he had to get up and leave for a real, legitimate emergency- she didn’t give him a freebie. and when he did start leaving her alone, she didn’t start pestering him! i don’t recall any mention of her helping him out or anything like that. 

since i went back through the game script to make notes for my comic, i’ve noticed that merlon is kinda sketchy in several ways, actually… did you notice pixl creation was banned? when merlon made tippi, he broke a serious law? merlon said it was the only way to save timpani… but did you notice that flipside has access to a variety of healing methods, including life shrooms?

anyway, if someone wrote a fic that really sold me on it, i might start looking at it differently. but otherwise that pairing seems extremely one-sided to me, to the point where one is just straight up harassing the other.

[pancakenpie]

Hmmm...that could be true...

But perhaps the curse Bleck’s father cast on her made typical healing difficult...

[weirdsciencefacts]

The big void

[pancakenpie]

Uhhh...

[deactivated-blog]

super paper mario more like super underrated mario

[pancakenpie]

Ooh! I love the wing arms idea for Luvbi!

[foureyedowl]

Alright, so, here’s an art trade I did with @spmcomic ! I had a ton of fun drawing and messing around a bit with their version of the crew! And i think I’m starting to get the hang of drawing backgrounds too! Thank you so much for doing this art trade with me! 

You can check their comic and overall art out on their tumblr or on devianart!

[spmcomic]

he’s going to make mimi sick with all that spice!!

[pancakenpie]

I like how unique this style of the characters looks! It’d sort of a darkly realistic look.

I really like Dimentio, especially! Very unnerving! And quite different form the usual look. He’s got more of a mystical mage vibe...and a Kefka-esque sadism lurking beneath somewhere.

...Uh, Mimi...? Are you...okay there?

[spmcomic]

ok, so for that ship ask meme, how about the classic, blupani? my sappy heart needs answers.

ah yes! The Canon Ship.

i mean, clearly they’re into each other, and willing to commit no matter the cost. that’s a good start. the memory cutscenes were very cute and painted a stark contrast to the gang’s shenanigans. the only friction we see these two experience is external pressure from blumiere’s father. 

the two of them are so gushy haha. with the way blumiere searches for timpani you would think they’d been in love forever, but the last time they spoke to each other they were out staring at the stars and being just as sappy as if they’d started dating a week ago. if they are able to be that absorbed in each other after that much time, even as they are dealing with serious outside problems (the conflict between the two communities, blumiere’s father lurking, their plan to leave), then i think the two of them could weather pretty much anything. 

however! however. timpani is horrified by the way blumiere responds to her disappearance, when they finally meet again. it is not romantic. it is absolutely brutal. knowing she’s the one thing standing between blumiere being sweet and silly, and blumiere letting everything die around him, orchestrating the beginning of that process himself, probably shook her up hard! he doesn’t even come around at her pep talk, so here we see she’s not even able to stand between the blumiere she likes and the desperately sad life-destroying depression hiding in there. he isn’t able to pick himself up until he sees that nastasia, o’chunks, and mimi still believe in him. that’s when the pure hearts reappear.

so like, obviously the two of them can’t weather pretty much anything, even if they still deeply and truly love each other. and they shouldn’t! you can’t get by with just one person in your life. and i don’t think the two of them have learned that lesson by the end of the game, if they even are still alive. 

and… timpani is willing to confront people (she slams mr. l pretty hard, obliterating him on the spot, and she goes back-and-forth with bowser a couple times if i remember correctly). blumiere is noooooot (delegating any and all punishments to nastasia, having some kind of mental breakdown the minute tippi challenges him in the sammer kingdom). if they got into any argument, alone together, especially about the events of the game, blumiere would cave in on himself! not because he should counter timpani’s points, or defend himself- but because he doesn’t bring up when he’s unhappy before it becomes a disaster. neither of them would have anywhere to go, if they were alone in that world at the end, to figure out how to articulate themselves better. blumiere is not a very functional or stable person, and it’s unfair to timpani to expect her to help him every single time he needs it, even if he is capable of supporting her in return. he can’t be expected to support her every single time she needs it, either.

they can’t be each other’s entire world because no one can be each other’s entire world. they would be just fine, if they had an outside friend circle, or any kind of social circle at all. it comes down to that. they can be very happy together with that one change.

the relationship is a little different in “filling the void” because blue is not a functional or stable person right out the gate. they have a lot of fun together every day, in small doses, but blue was raised with 0 social skills. timpani notices pretty much right away that she would never be able to go to him with problems that weren’t extremely simple to understand or needed more than some reassurance. timpani herself, on the other hand, has a lot of energy at all times and despite everything still misjudges his ability to be a “good” person. when he doesn’t know any better, she get stuck on how he could *not* know any better. 

these problems aren’t serious in the beginning because they spend most of their day away from each other. keeps things simple. but if they had escaped, and run away together- these would be terrible problems within a few months at most. blue does not have a lot of luck interacting with humans during his travels, so if he was with timpani, it would mean the two of them would spend a lot of time alone together, and even when not alone, they would not have any other friends. they might have more luck than he and nastasia did, but i imagine they would still spend a lot of time drifting from town to town, only staying as long as they could stand feeling “tolerated but not accepted.” and then, a few years in, blue’s illness would start manifesting noticeable symptoms- the zoning out, the memory loss. timpani wouldn’t know what to do with that! 

the story would be that of two people who love each other very much and are attracted to each other, but life circumstances make them unhappy and nearly incompatible. but they both grow a lot over this story, and by the end of it i wanted to have them in a place (physically, emotionally) where they could work it out and be happy together even with these external problems. because i ship it.

[pancakenpie]

Wow

I never thought about their relationship in this way. It’s very realistic. Very heart-breaking and raw, but very well thought out, considering what both their psychological characterizations could be. I can see both Blu and Tippi showing these traits in game.

And yet…the game ends on such a positive note. I do believe (and hope!) they have a truly happy life together; perhaps this whole terrible disaster might’ve had one good outcome—bringing these two closer than perhaps they would’ve been if they had succeeded in eloping together.

[dragon-fiish-deactivated2021040]

Hi I drew Mimi again because I care her

[pancakenpie]

What a cute outfit!

She looks a bit mystical and gypsy-ish

(I like to think she’s wearing this when she’s working at Merlee’s, post game).

[pancakenpie]

Hey, everyone!

This fella named Arlo is trying to gain signatures for a petition to remake Paper Mario: Thousand Year Door! It’s getting REALLY close to its maximum amount!

If any of you guys want to chip in, it’d really help! I, for one, would LOVE to be able to play a remake of it one day...who knows? Every little bit helps!

Let's Show Nintendo How Much We Want Thousand Year Door HD

[cowsaresushi-coral]

“Cool to be young~”

[pancakenpie]

Is this Bruno Mars Bleck?

I love it

[sleepybear222-deactivated202404]

got bored last night and made these!

[pancakenpie]

Oh, how cute!! I’ll definitely use these!

[boomsheikas-art-blog]

More Super Paper Mario redesigns! This time I did Jaydees and Merlee

[pancakenpie]

Ah! I love these! It’s amazing how much they match their sprites!

[pancakenpie]

What’s up with Luigi and the Chaos Heart?

So, on the topic of Super Dimentio and all...

Does anyone else wonder what made Luigi, of all people, a “perfect host” for the Chaos Heart?

How can such a mild-mannered fella be a great container for this eldritch thing of chaos and destruction?

It’s even more intriguing when you consider the themes of the game, with its focus on order and chaos, light and darkness, and the power of both love and hatred. There’s certainly this pseudo-Ying-Yang theme going on (look at the creation of Flip and Flopside as an example. Merlon and Nolrem mention how one side needed the other to create a “balanced” dimension).

A mural of Flipside and Flopside from one of the Trial Pits.

I suppose Luigi goes with this theme with his infamous “dark side”, Mr. L. He seems to be the complete opposite of the Luigi’s shy, awkward, and friendly behavior: he’s confident (to the point of narcissism), prides himself in being stylish (though it can be argued he still is a bit of a dork), and as rude as guy like Luigi can be (“Mr. Stomps-A-Lot!”).

It’s also funny how he becomes an amazing mechanic out of nowhere (as I am unsure if such abilities were ever attributed to him before); perhaps it represents a latent side of ingenuity the green brother never had the chance to show before—or a potential for craft that he never could realize without more self-confidence.

Perhaps this “hidden darkness” made him a perfect host. However, if darkness was an important chatacteristic, a guy like Bowser could’ve been a good pick. More likely, this nature of having a conflicting “double self” made him a good container, because the heart is an incarnation of chaos after all. And what is chaos but the struggle BETWEEN evil and good?

If the themes of SPM focus on the balance of light and darkness, perhaps the Chaos Heart represents an imbalance between the two...perhaps even an inward one, as it also is a heart...a “spiritual heart” is something that is envisioned the seat of one’s emotions, identity, or soul. Having a struggle within one’s heart is chaotic and painful, bringing about behavior and consequences that make it evident in a person’s life.

The Chaos Heart in all its dark glory.

Count Bleck is a good example of representing this struggle, especially in relation to his dichotomy of identity: the light of Blumiere and the darkness of Count Bleck. It is evident throughout the story that he struggles with both aspects of his identity- although he states that “Blumiere is dead” and assumes a facade of the Card-Carrying Villain, he still shows evidence of morality as shown in his guilt, compassion, and even affability that defines his former self. What more, he struggles with simultaneous feelings of hatred for the world that fights with his kinder nature: he wants all worlds to end, yet can’t help showing a benevolent towards his minions.

This inner conflict is perhaps why the count made a good incarnation it the Heart for a time, as this painful struggle was a perfect place for chaos to subsist. It is intriguing how by the time Heart is removed forcibly by Mario and Co., he had already made a spiritual decision of removal: he was fully committed to die and bring his destructive plans to an end, finding peace in knowing Timpani was alive. This is a complete change in character, in that for so long he feared never being able to see her again.

Although not stated, one could also infer that he also assumed that he would likely not see her in the afterlife, as he would have to face judgement for his deeds as the champion of destruction. In simply being happy that she'd live a long life, even one without him, even one where she perhaps finds new love and a life wholly devoid of him...yes, one certainly can say he changed greatly from the beginning to the end. He completely let go of that chaos within himself that he held onto for so long...and in this way, the facade of Count Bleck finally melted away to reveal the seemingly-dead Blumiere that was there all along; older, more tired, and less innocent, but wiser and finally at peace.

Nastasia is pretty much my face throughout this entire scene.

Whoops, there I go talking about Bleck (guess who’s my favorite character?). So...what does all of this have to do with Luigi?

Thinking back on all of this, I have to wonder if the "conflict" thing would explain his strange role. I could infer that Luigi had deep feelings of insecurity and resentment for being "second banana". These feelings fighting with his friendly and kind nature woul indeed cause emotional turmoil. Yet, again, I could INFER that. Nowhere in the game does Nintendo decide to portray Luigi with such a psychology. If his script is any indicator, he is still a lovable goofball as Mr. L (and not some angst-ridden anti-hero). He doesn't even have any memories of his darker side, which would’ve been a perfect way to have scenes of him recognizing and coping with it.

So all I can do with him is guess; I mean, I have been inferring with the Count as well, but there’s enough in the script to leave hints for interpetation. With the Green Thunder, it’s more ambiguous. As much is think having Luigi having some great struggle with his dark side would be wonderfully dramatic, I can’t say for sure if that’s what the creators of the game were going for thematically. (Though for all I know, they made Luigi the Heart’s host just because they thought it sounded cool).

This pretty much sums up the limit of Luigi’s identity crisis within the game.

With that said, I like to think there’s this subtext there. It’d certainly explain the Chaos Heart thing!

But hey, I’d love to hear what you guys think. Any other theories?