Failte200: Alone, Together.

After yesterday's post, I decided to jump right off the deep end of the pool. If fanfiction is legitimate, then what is a good example? What is the "Moby Dick" of fanfiction? Or, at least, what could be a candidate for such a thing?

Remember, the power in fanfiction isn't the same as printed literature. Since the characters and settings are mostly pre-made, the originality in the story is more about themes, situations, and realistic reactions of characters to these. A good parallel would be historical fiction or alternative history. In both cases the story often concerns portrayals of historical figures and events. Even if these are manipulated, the portrayal has to feel true enough to the originals to be believable. So true with fanfiction.

In addition, and as I mentioned yesterday, the quality of copy-editing is a consideration only so far as it distracts from the story. It's taken for granted that there will be imperfections.

One of the common themes in fanfiction is homosexual romance, aka "slash". Which makes sense, because there is very little gay and lesbian fiction in print, mostly because it "won't sell" or is censored via homophobia. Fanfiction is often a creative outlet for people who wish there was more gay romance out there. Things are shifting with the advent of Kindle books, but there still seems to be very little of it. What is clear is that mainstream portrayals of gay and lesbian romance are often focused more on the politics of the matter rather than the actual romance. This includes a number of sad, cliche tropes such as Bury Your Gays. People often read romance for happy endings (see every Disney movie with a female lead ever), so it's not much fun to see gay couples struggle through adversity over and over just to have them unfulfilled or dead at the end. Bleh.

On the other hand, gay couples are freed from the standard heterosexual tropes where men are from Mars and women are from Venus. Slash often has an element of gender role deconstruction and communication between partners not seen in traditional romance, which makes their love feel more real than straight romance. "It's...It's almost as if she's a person with her own thoughts and feelings and reasons outside the social construct of her gender. *gasp* ...and so am I." Whowuddathunk?

With these in mind, I'd like to present the best story I've ever read, in terms of my emotional reaction, handling of themes, and how much I've obsessed over it. Sadly, I'm ashamed of it. I consider myself reasonably well read, so my taste can't be that far in outer space. Tell people your favorite novel is Don Quixote, and they'll either think you're pretentious or a fair appraiser of literary quality. Tell them your favorite story is a work of femmeslash fanfiction derived from a 90s American animated TV series, and they'll think you are a loser. Despite being legitimate, I still feel the stigma. I'm showing my vulnerability here. Be gentle (if anyone ever even reads this).

First, the author. Failte200 is an author of both fanfiction and original, Internet-published works who specializes in homosexual romance, particularly gay male originals in recent years. But he got started  through femmslash fanfiction. On his Wattpad profile, he writes: "I used to write femmslash fanfics for Kim Possible. Go ahead and laugh. A Disney kid's cartoon. When I did, I'd only seen a single episode of the actual show, and didn't really like it much. But the characters...there was SO much yummy potential there that I went LOOKING for fanfics (I didn't even know such things existed at the time) and one thing lead to another..." Of these earlier works, Alone, Together is his pièce de résistance. There is a (probably treading a narrow line of legality) dead tree version through this website, not by the author. And there is also a TV Tropes page.

------

The following content is largely self plagarism from two reviews of this story I posted at Fanfiction.net. Which no one probably cares about (what's the artistic value of fanfiction reviews?) but I'd rather not be accused of using someone else's text without attribution.

Also, familiarity with the Kim Possible universe is not really necessary to appreciate this story. It is above all, a story about themes, with KP World as a backdrop.

-------

This epic, if I may be allowed to call it that, is about what happens when ego and vanity meet adversity and being so utterly destroyed, a person is forced to confront The Other. The thing that happens is love. Not usually right away, and not always romantic love, but love the same.

The summary: Two young women start off as enemies, the Action Girl protagonist Kim Possible, and The Dragon, Shego. They are flung, through accidental SCIENCE(!) into another world. A world that suddenly found itself without any people. Sure, the trappings are still there, the items, the mementos, the war machines and the churches. But no people; like a post-apocalyptic world with only two survivors, like a world in which a total Rapture had just happened without the Empty Piles of Clothing. And coming to grips with this, these enemies flee each other to largely wallow in their own misery.

Let's talk about the world they arrive in, because the whole idea has me nearly crying in terror. It's a near extreme combination of The Aloner and Unexpectedly Abandoned. And it's the complete subversion of Nothing is Scarier, because there really is no one, anywhere. Take the zombies out of a zombie apocalypse where everyone is already dead, there's no monsters anywhere. There are animals (see below), but no people, no scary beasts other than what nature might wrought. Most of which can be easily avoided since the leftovers from civilization are everywhere. The terror comes from the aloneness itself, the whole world is like an isolation tank or a desert island, and there's no boat coming, so you best get settled or go gibbering mad. A monophobe's worst nightmare.

Narcissism (which is /the/ psychological disorder of our age) has a hard time surviving in a vacuum. It needs a constant boost from props (i.e., everyone else) or it destroys itself, sometime the diseased with it. Symptoms of vanity and pride and ego do not survive very long when the whole world supporting it is gone. From Chapter 2: "Ace pilot, extreme martial-artist, plasma-spewing Villainess, not to mention Stone Cold Fox – and for what? For who? Who was going to be impressed now? What could she steal? Who could she piss-off? Who would be eating their heats out over her?" Or from the other woman's perspective, "In January she heard "Kim, it's me" instead, and right behind her. Her heart skipped a beat. She knew by this time that Shego would not be there. She forced herself to remain seated, and read the same sentence in her Advanced Engineering Mathematics book over and over: "This can be proved by setting x 0 over all values of R and taking the limit..."". For one, ennui, for the other obsession, but for both, the end of vanity and ego by isolation. Being The Aloner causes insanity, but it can also deliver from self-importance.

So they seek each other out, and in that moment are forced to confront the fact that there is another PERSON, not just a prop or a foil, but an actual other person, not a mirror of themselves, but The Other, the unknown not-me-different-from-me. And when people genuinely do so, the first thing that comes is empathy (as seen in Chapter 3).

But my argument is, and this is something that this story shows so clearly, is that, if narcissism is truly destroyed, and The Other is truly confronted (and mutually so; this is not one sided), that empathy will inevitably turn into love. And I don't mean lust, though this story has plenty of that as well, but actual, self sacrificing love. We see that again and again, and it isn't just some loneliness Stockholm syndrome either. The two examples in Chapter 4, the dogs and the operation, clearly show it's not just 'I need a warm body to not go insane'. And there are numerous more examples throughout the first 8 chapters as they endure hardship and near tragedy, repeatedly self sacrificing for each other. The most poignant of these is in climax Chapter 8, and yes I do mean climax, though the story is only half over. They manage to make it back home, but the story doesn't end there. The denouement is important for other reasons. At the climax, the two trade, first: a chance to return to the previous reality for the happiness of the other, and second: the ability to remain in the reality they had created for the life of the other.

 During this later part of the Other World sequence, there are moments of extreme loneliness in sharp contrast with Beautiful Voids, as they explore North America, are lost to one another, and are found by one another again.

And then, having spent 21 years, a lifetime really, together in empathy and friendship and true self sacrificing love, they are sucked back through the wormhole to 13 days after they left, and all their memories from that time are erased.

Some more about aloneness. When they return after the Climax, at the beginning of the Denouement, they're alone again. The aloneness has done a switcheroo. It's not the lack of people now, people are everywhere. When Red and Doc were together, in that world, they were alone, but they weren't lonely. Now they're not alone, but their lonely, and they don't know /why/. So, inevitably, not understanding everything, they try to fill the gaps, and the only thing that ends up working is reconnecting.

Of course, they slowly regain their memories and you could at this point claim, LOOK, it's just another cheesy story. It's like how Huck Finn wasn't /really/ about racism, see, look at the ending, it's just a silly story about a tween boy who goes on an adventure! To that I say, thank /GOD/ Derrida was right and we are freed from that tyranny of pure text readings. Chapters 9 and on are the denouement because they come after the climax and show why exactly everything that happened was so damn important. These women are originally pulled from their narcissism by flinging them from the world that built it, and then, plopped back into the world they found themselves in again, they were unable to fall back into the same patterns.

And it wasn't /just/ the memories. It took time for those to return, and they did so one by one, over years (and assumed to continue past the end of the story). The experience of ego-death and The Other had changed them so profoundly that even without the memories they could tell something was off. The memories were a tip off, but not the reason. And they try to change back; my favorite examples are the attempted seductions. And yes, /both/ of them were attempts/acts/pretending that they were the same people they left. And both of them utterly failed in the same way: treating other people as a prop to their desires just didn't do it for them anymore. When they finally admit that, the cycle is complete, and then the rest (Chapters 14 to The End) is truly wrap up.

What struck me over and over about this story was, despite how different of people they were, and their lack of attraction beforehand, they ended up coming to love each other. It wasn't out of some shared previous interest. It wasn't just, as I said, a loneliness Stockholm's syndrome. It was the experiences they had and the things that they did for each other that became their love. Not their thoughts or their feelings, but their actions. Force any two people into a situation where they have to confront The Other, they MUST, to survive, even two of the worst narcissists of all time, and love will come out of it. You see this theme again and again in romance, mutual love coming out of adversity, why, WHY? Because adversity strips the vanity and ego that get in the way of love. Seeing this has made me question some of my own decisions, and my motives, and the person I want to be.

I continue to obsess over this story, despite it being fanfiction. It's been 6 months since I first read it and I still can't let it go. It's what convinced me that fanfiction was more than a scratchpad hobby. Other people have similar opinions, I'm not alone. I think I understand why now. And that is, that despite (or perhaps because of) all the messages inducing narcissism in our culture, people love a story that offers self-sacrifice and empathy. Because that thing which is discouraged, that love that leads to deep meaningful living with /other people/, that is what we actually want.

The legitimacy of fanfiction.

First, an article by the AI specialist Eliezer Yudkowsky. Actually, no; I can't seem to find the article in the bowels of the Internet, so I'll instead try to summarize. Aside from his rationality and AI work, Yudkowsy is well known for writing fanfiction, in particular, the hugely massive Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality, a sprawling what-if now over 100 chapters and 500 thousand words. In his article, Yudkowsky described his affection for iconoclasm in the literary sense, id est, a critic of the severest level, who overturns idols of the mind. And he sees fanfiction as one such genre of art that is consistently reviled as trash. So, being the iconoclast he is, he writes fanfiction. Some bloody good fanfiction, in many people's opinions. Methods of Rationality has more reviews on Fanfiction.net than any other story.

It's interesting how fanfiction is very much like that other artform, Let's Plays, which is what I planned this blog to be about (and promptly forgot it). They're both partial derivative works, they both tend to violate copyright law, if even in a small way. And they both are universally rejected as art or artistic media.

Now, I'm not going to quote authors on the value of fanfic in their artistic development. Nor am I going to do more than mention 50 Shades of Grey, which famously started out as Twilight fanfiction. Both of these things are much like the presence of women in Congress while the patriarchy still reigns. And, frankly, all of those examples do not show the legitimacy of fanfiction because fundamentally fanfiction is not legitimate under the old order of publishing. The success of modern fanfiction is due to the no-man's land of the Internet, since derivative stories provide free of charge tend to be ignored by lawyers as long as the standard disclaimer is there. Legitimacy of a work of literature isn't based on whether it can be distributed in print. This isn't science, it doesn't need to pass peer review to be read.

What is fanfiction? Defined by me: a derivative work of literature that borrows the characters, settings, and/or situations of previous authors to produce new content (i.e., stories). This is not a new idea, in fact, it's the oldest idea in literature. Take the Greek classics, especially the playwrights. How many versions of Orestia were written, or the Oedipus Cycle? How about Virgil's Aeneid? And, if we're going there, how about Virgil in Dante's Inferno? Shakespeare certainly liked to borrow; is the Bard then suspect, sullied somehow? Of course not.

Yet, and probably with the onset of copyright, derivative works are seen as lesser. This is often of course due to copy-edit quality, but I can think of many books published hastily and full of mistakes. At least on the Internet an author can make instantaneous corrections. My appreciation of a piece of literature stems on punctuation, capitalization, spelling, and grammar insofar as it is distracting. Otherwise, other story elements rule, like plot and themes.

It may be copyright itself, that stories, including their characters, are intellectual property of the original authors, not only legally, but in some metaphysical way. They are not to be handled by other, unskilled fingers, nor shall canon be usurped, lest they be tarnished. Or, the "unoriginality" puts its value in question. Nevermind all tens of thousands of Harlequin pulps about exactly the same thing with the names changed and the situations ever-so-slightly different.

The third reason is that they are free, that no one makes money from them. Which is a pretty stupid way of determining legitimacy of art. It stems from the capitalist mindset, that to be of worth, something must have monetary value.

With copyright, taste, and capitalism against them, fanfictions are ignored in the art world. Well, who needs those smug bastards anyway? Something something Shakespeare something rose something sweetness.

In fact, fanfiction tends to do a few things better than printed works. In particular, fanfiction authors are free of "what is publishable" constraints and can play with themes to their heart's content. It doesn't matter that a story idea would never sell if thousands of people will read it on the Internet.
Another reason fanfiction authors have so much room for theme play is they are not forced to generate characters and backgrounds from scratch. Have a particular theme or situation you want to try out? Plop down the premade personalities and go at it! In terms of their themes, several fanfictions are among the most remarkable stories I've ever read. Fanfiction authors can also generate these stories rapidly and get equally rapid feedback, which means the author and reviewers often end up almost in collaborating, developing the ideas together as the story progresses.

Derivative works are legitimate, when you get past opinions, money, and laws. Indeed, the whole concept of legitimacy is vague and tied more to individual feelings than some unifying notion. And when you get down to the bottom, it's all derivative in some shape or form. To paraphrase a popular claim, everything is a fanfiction; works only differ in that respect by degree.

Minecraft and Saga Storytelling.

Several LP'ers have said that they will not let's play Minecraft because, as all sandbox type games, it has no obvious endpoint. NintendoCapriSun stated in an update video, "It's not a game that can be LP'ed, as far as I'm concerned, as there really is no end to it". A definite ending is often taken as a requirement for let's plays, though this is an unwritten rule and not overall accepted. It is considered bad form to stop a let's play in the middle of a game and never finish, but such proscriptions are again useless for games that never end.

Most video games follow a type of storytelling which Joseph Cambel calls the Monomyth, or Hero's Journey. There is a protagonist, who has some problem to be faced, usually with some antagonist hindering his progress. Various puzzles or quests along the way to the solution are overcome. The conflict escalates to a climax, the protagonist is victorious over the problem (and usually the antagonist), and in the denouement he returns to his life before the issue began or at least goes on to do something else. It makes an excellent pattern for video games as well as literature because it is easily recognized by the player. Games in general, not only video games, follow this cycle of conflict.

But this is not the only format for storytelling. In icelandic saga, a story consists of a long string of interconnected episodes, of which there may be no clear resolution except that the last word is reached. Njal's Saga consists of a family feud leading to violence and exile, and culminates with the burning alive of the warrior sage Njal within his house, but there is no clear resolution, and the parts of the story are episodes of violence and meetings at the law rock interspersed with times of quiet. While Njal is the most prominent character, he can hardly be said to be a protagonist or hero, and the story continues after his death. The Homeric epic poem Iliad is very similar, with many characters and no clear protagonist, the story consisting of a string of episodes culminating with the death of Hector, and the Trojan war continues after the Iliad ends.

Storytelling in Minecraft is far closer to that of the saga than the hero's journey. A player is set in a randomly generated wilderness where he or she must fight to survive the darkness of night, build a shelter, make tools, delve into the earth, and explore the world, but there is no clear problem beyond this basic need for survival. Interesting events of finding precious minerals, finishing a house, discovering a deep chasm and fighting a creeper are all interspersed with more mudane events of cutting wood, farming wheat, and digging stone, so the whole experience is purely episodic. There is no overall build to a climax, and no clear resolution. The game ends when the player runs out of things he or she wants to do, or creates a new world to start fresh. This is of course not the only way to play Minecraft, but it is the stock method and the method most players choose to take.

I previously defined a good LP as being one that crafts a story whereby both the viewer and player are entertained. Since I have shown that storytelling in Minecraft follows the same format as saga storytelling, I believe that a good LP in Minecraft is possible as long as we accept that it will be episodic, have no clear resolution, i.e., have all the characters of a saga.

X's Adventures in Minecraft is a series of videos by Youtube user daviddr64yt, uploaded between August 2010 and April 2011, with the main set of episodes uploaded in August and September. The series ended after X [davidr64yt] became bored with the replay value of the game and wrote a long blog post about how Notch (the creator) might improve it for adventure inclined players. The main run consists of 47 episodes as X learns his way around the wilderness of Minecraft, builds a fortress, digs deep into the earth, works with redstone and tnt, and discovers buried dungeons. This first "arc" of 29 episodes leads to X leaving the "X-Cave" and traveling across the water to a new land, bringing only his original crafting bench along with him. The "Death Mountain" sequence, lasting until his death 10 episodes later. Since there was no way to reset spawn points during his LP, X is returned to the X-Cave. The realization that his first crafting bench was left behind leads him on an Odyssey like quest of retrieval and return home, possibly the most touching video of Minecraft ever recorded (helped massively by the Windwaker sailing theme). The final videos trail off as X becomes increasingly disinterested with Minecraft.

The two sequences, and indeed, every episode, can be watched independently and enjoyed, yet are linked together by the main thread of the saga. Despite there being no climax or definite ending, X's Adventures in Minecraft is an engaging let's play experience, and good storytelling. LP'ers shouldn't shy away from Minecraft as a storytelling medium.

A note on criticism.

Since I will soon be venturing out into the world of high profile LP'ers, I wanted to make a clear statement about the purposes of this blog, my intent, and the meaning of criticism.

You will notice that I don't use a rating system. Most commonly, these take the form of a series of numbers from 1 to 10 indicating by some (often unknown, always subjective) standard) how excited that particular person is about an object d'art. My purpose is not to review LPs. I am not here to say "well, this is good so you should watch it", or "this is horrible, you should avoid it". I am not a reviewer, I do not review LPs.

Criticism is (quoting La Wiki): "the study, evaluation, and interpretation of literature, social movements, film, arts, and similar objects and events. The goal of this type of criticism is to understand the work or event more thoroughly." If I am criticizing an LP, it's an evaluation of it's qualities in a greater context of film and literature to understand it's place (and LPs in general) within the wider world of art and human culture. It's taking a look at a work's merits and faults overall, and not simply it's faults. My intent is not to upset people or make them feel bad; feel free to disagree with my attempts at writing, my opinions, my subjective viewpoints.

That being said, the majority of art is mediocre. Very little art is truly abysmal, and even less is extraordinary. You'll be able to tell if I enjoyed a work by my critique, but given I have limited time I probably will be criticizing little that I don't enjoy. Overall, I follow Eric Swain's guidelines on avoiding pretentiousness, a good post addressing not only video game criticism but also literary criticism as well as honesty in video game reviews.

Don't take it personally. I'm just taking art seriously. You take fun seriously, so you should understand.

Chewbot: The Terrible Secret of Animal Crossing.

Attention: Spoilers ahead. Consider this the case for any of my posts.

In general, Animal Crossing for the gamecube and it's derivitives on other Nintento systems are considered to be children's games. They are in the social simulation genre, meant to depict AI and human proxied characters in interaction. The most well known title of the social simulation genre is The Sims, where people are moved around in virtual lives in a virtual world. Animal Crossing works similarly, except instead of people it has anthropomorphic animals. The primary gameplay mechanic is collection and trading of items with the other characters, and the mood is generally lighthearted.

In 2008, the Something Awful user Chewbot began playing Animal Crossing: Wild World for the Nintendo DS, finding that the scenario and dialogue taken out of context could quickly become nightmare fuel. The result was a screenshot LP titled The Terrible Secret of Animal Crossing.

Screenshot let's plays juxtapose images of gameplay with adjacent text to tell a story, often elaborating upon the plot of the game. In the case of Chewbot's story, the plot was almost completely fabricated. A young boy named Billy is sent off to camp at Animal Crossing, and finds that something is off. Investigating further, he discovers an elaborate conspiracy dominated by the anthropomorphic raccoon Tom Nook. Near the climax, gruesome fanart (and even a fanimation) replaces the screenshots. Various bits of scripted conversation and letters lead to a growing unease of the unknown evil that is keeping Billy and the other children in the camps. This Lovecraftian horror changes suddenly as we learn that Tom is not the villain, and of the real story behind the crossing. Chewbot creatively used stationary throughout to craft haunting letters which are not stock for the game, yet do not violate the game mechanics. The two endings are interchangable as they both start before the big reveal, the former ending in a victorious yet somber rescue and the latter in nightmare. The addition of two audio tracks, one for the first chapter and one of the final, is appreciated but incomplete, as if they were planned as a full project but never finished. This work walks a fine line between fanfiction and let's play, with just enough elements of let's play to fall on that side. The result is a lighthearted childrens game is transformed into survival horror more akin to Eternal Darnkess: Sanity's Requiem.

Like most good horror, the elements are subtle and slowly build over time. In context, the character lines used in the screenshots were probably much less creepy, but the initial scene with the taxi driver, Kapp'n, where he says, "I'll just have to make you work it off, HAR HAR HAR! Welcome to camp!" seems almost as dark innuendo alone. Gyroids, originally an item which dances and makes music (or multipurpose item in other versions), is reimagined as sinister artifacts which turn people into anthropomorphic animals. Even the title, Animal Crossing, is used to refer to the period of time between traveling to the island and becoming like the rest of the inhabitants. None of this is known to the reader till the reveal in chapters 8 and 9, with a second reveal in the first ending. The second ending is much more of cosmic horror; there is no escape for the character, who is left in a living nightmare that he now welcomes. The main plot and second ending parallel Lovecraft's Shadow over Innsmouth, where the narrator slowly becomes aware of the creeping evil in the town he is visiting, that the inhabitants are born human and turn into monsters, and by the end he is one of them. In contrast, the first ending jumps away from Lovecraft roots by revealing the true mastermind behind the child slavery and switching to slasher and gore to invoke horror, after which Billy gives a "10 years later" epilogue. Both are nightmare fuel, especially with the digital scene paintings.

I don't think I will soon forget the line "my favorite is rabbit =)". I also don't believe I will ever be playing these games; I enjoy my sleep.

A nebulous definition of "let's play".

To establish let's play as a genre, I first have to describe just what is a let's play. In simplest terms, a let's play is sampling of a video game joined to commentary. It is a combination of the video game itself, whether by film or photography, accompanied by the commentary of the player and their play.

While these two elements are always present, the rest is variable. The format could be in writing accompanied by screenshots, or film accompanied by disembodied voice. The commentary could be live (to the game play) or inserted afterwards. The player could be playing an entire game or merely part (and there are arguments as to if playing only part of a game is still a let's play, which I won't antagonize here). The commentary could be attempting to craft a particular story, or the player could simply be waxing nostalgic on childhood memories. Cheating may be encouraged or vilified. I would go so far as to suggest that the commentary could be silent, if the gameplay allows the player to emote their experience adequately.

The genre in name originated on the Something Awful Forums in 2006, but the activity of playing video games and commenting on them has been going on much longer. I'm sure many people have childhood memories of sitting around watching friends play video games and talking. The activity of recording video game play probably originated in walkthroughs and speed runs, and with the advent of Internet video sharing these became much easier to distribute. My primary source of let's plays is Youtube, which biases my viewing towards films with live commentary.

With such a broad genre involving several media, it's easier to say what is not a let's play. A mere walkthrough is not a let's play, or at best, is a very poor let's play if it includes commentary. A speed run is not a let's play, as these are generally not matched to commentary. A piece of pure fanfiction is not a let's play, as it doesn't actually include elements of gameplay (e.g. screenshots, footage), though a let's play may exaggerate elements to develop a story.

Therefore, a mediocre let's play is simply one that provides average gameplay with commentary on the activity but does not attempt to craft anything greater. A bad let's play is one where either the gameplay or commentary (or both) create a distasteful, unpleasant or boring experience where no one is having fun.

An exemplar let's play is one that joins superior gameplay to fine commentary in order to craft a story where both the player and the viewer/reader is entertained.

Zisteau: Super Hostile Kaizo Caverns and Legendary.

Zisteau of Youtube, originally known for his Piggy Temple (not available) and Survival Island videos, has over the past year crafted an engaging experience through Vechs' Super Hostile map series in Minecraft. After a hard drive failure in March 2011 ended his previous works, Zisteau began a video memorializing his lost save files and film footage, after which he falls into a trap and finds himself stuck at the beginning of Super Hostile 06 Kaizo Caverns.

Super Hostile custom maps, created by Vechs, were intended to be a Minecraft version of the infamous Kaizo Mario hack, pitting the player against dangers in what is often considered to be too easy of a game. Much of the success of the series can be attributed to Zisteau's let's play, as well as his earlier videos of Super Hostile 01 Sea of Flame 1.0 (also lost in the hard drive crash). This map series incorporates a design called Complete the Monument, where the player must survive and pass various difficult trials and deadly traps to find chests filled with wool and return these colored wool to complete a victory monument. Super Hostile therefore combines both survival and adventure Minecraft play for a truly unique experience. Several other map designers have attempted similar CTM projects, but none of these approach the quality and deviousness of Vechs' Super Hostile maps.

Zisteaus's careful and methodical pacing in SH 06 (and later in SH 07) is indicative of his skill as a player, as is his low number of deaths in one of the most difficult Minecraft custom maps ever created. The struggle can be likened to a dungeon crawl with an evil dungeon master always one step ahead of the intrepid hero. Vechs's craft often addresses Zisteau and other Youtube LP'ers directly with cameos on signs and references to earlier adventures, which strengthens the feeling that Vechs is actually staring down at the player from a scrying mirror. As Zisteau progresses the rooms become increasingly perilous, but he continues to be lighthearted against the spiteful creator, even creating a large scale working rollercoaster in one of the chambers, with concession stands staffed by monsters. This mocking back and forth commentary is reminisce of Diomedes who, after wounding both Ares and Aphrodite on the battlefield of Troy, stood his ground against Apollo. Vechs is the deity of the map, and it is his intent in all cases to kill the player as many times as possible.

After a 50 episode struggle culminating with the Citadel of Demons, Zisteau triumphantly completes the victory monument and seeks to escape Kaizo Caverns through the Nether. This is not to be, as like Oddyseus he is waylaid from his path and sent to peril in Super Hostile 07 Legendary. Unlike Kaizo Caverns which claims the title of merely "very difficult", Legendary is deemed "ROM-hack hard". This is both in reference to difficulty and its unforgiving nature, as traditionally ROM-hacks such as Kaizo Mario included unfair cruelty to the player. This is most apparent in I Wanna Be The Guy, a sidescrolling action/puzzle platformer with unfair traps at every step intended to frustrate and enrage. Zisteau takes this change in stride, and continues his systematic conquering under Vechs' gaze. That he has twice fallen back into a Super Hostile map 'against his will' alludes that like Sisyphus he may never escape his hell, but who knows if Sisyphus was not content.

In transitions, opening sequences and footage editing, Zisteau shines. Behind the scenes footage shows that the fall from grace into Kaizo Caverns was a well crafted TNT explosion all the way to bedrock, taking many hours and several attempts to film. In both series the title sequence for each episode sets the mood with appropriate music. This is especially apparent in Legendary, where a cinematic of the episode's landscapes flash with Night on Bald Mountain as background can best be described as epic. Tedious footage of building and mining are expertly cut and blended together with little lost. It seems Zisteau may even be setting off various traps intentionally to provide catharsis for the viewer, though there is no direct evidence of this.

Zisteau's commentary style for these series is blind, and he is actively disinterested in spoiling his experience with knowledge of what comes next. The commentary flows from his excitement and fear, yet he is more like a Greek hero than an unfortunate, donning his "manpance" armor and wielding a sign. He has a love affair with unconventional weapons, including the aforementioned signs, maps and lava buckets, which he calls "advanced lighting techniques". Zisteau makes pronouncements as a king commanding nothing but himself. Thankfully, he has little in the way of catch phrases so his speech is otherwise natural sounding and unscripted, and he is not overly serious, willing to laugh at himself as he fails.

Zisteau may one day escape the clutches of Vechs, but that is yet to be seen. His LP of Legendary is ongoing, with perhaps 1/5th of the map finished after 14 episodes.