Green With Envy: Crab Helmet's Foe Fiction! {Rise of the Dragon Lords}

[Nathanael D. Striker]

Ryan: Whats a Duel Academy?

 

OH GOD IT'S ANDY FROM ADVANCED WARS.

 

...That story melted my eyes. It was so, so painful...

 

Isn't that the point of Foe Fiction? We get to laugh at horrible stories.

[CrabHelmet]

Something from that story that I didn't get around to showing you guys was that TheGameTripleH screws up even worse on his hideous formatting for announcing ATK stats and stuff eventually, so he forgets to close all his tags, so part of the actual text of the story is in Comic Sans or something like that. But getting to that part would have required dredging through the rest of this mess, so I decided it wasn't worth it just for that one gag.

[Phantom Roxas]

I might be inclined to blame that on the new system, but that doesn't make the story any better.

 

Glad to see you're back.

[CrabHelmet]

Yeah, the new system is actually giving me a lot of trouble. It keeps inserting extra blank lines in random places and making my review center-aligned.

 

[spoiler=Saturday Night's Alright For Fighting - {Yu-Gi-Oh! Demanding Identity}]One. Two. Four. Four. Two. La. La la. La la la la. La la la la. La la.

 

It won't stop. Even when I'm not reviewing, it won't stop. It's taken too strong a hold. Something slipped through when they opened that portal, and it was enough. It's not going to fall away. And it's driving me just crazy enough that I think reviewing this trash might be a decent idea.

 

This next story was written by ♠Decietful King♠ over two months ago, but was recently bumped with the explanation that it hadn't been updated because they were in a car accident. And since I'm a fan of kicking people while they're down, especially if those people are so bad at writing that they misspell their own name (the word you're looking for is "Deceitful"), let's dive into Yu-Gi-Oh! Demanding Identity.

Excuse me; based on this logo, what I actually meant was "Yu-Gi-Oh: [Oversized Illegible Blob]". One, two, four, four, two.

 

Prologue

 

Note that all the chapters have titles, but the Prologue does not. Apparently, coming up with a title was too much work.

 

Despite his repeated distractions the independent spirit, Aster, continued his search of the "item" he continuously had been mumbling about.

 

Ugh. This is the painfully awkward prose we have in store for us? I'm sure every commenter in this topic jumped on how clunky the writing is. Cue the very first line of the very first comment:

 

Hm. I think you've got a good writing style

The horror. The horror. One two four four two.

 

Aster's spiky red hair caught in the feverish wind. His distracted green eyes looked in and out through the prickly, and greenish-blue hued bush. Aster looked around the quite, still and beautiful hill.

 

I actually feel kind of bad here because most fanfics' problem is that they don't include any description at all, and I don't want to discourage making an effort to describe things. The problem here is that the description is incredibly awkward. The author's favourite part of speech seems to be the adjective, so every single noun comes with at least one adjective, and more than half of them come with a chain of two or three adjectives attached.

 

Good writing doesn't need to stick three adjectives in front of a word to paint a picture (or, in this case, two adjectives and the word "quite" where an adjective would have been if this had been proofread by someone competent). Adjectives are considered one of the weakest parts of speech, second only to adverbs (which are weak for exactly the same reasons), because they're a way of tacking on description that wasn't able to fit into the noun itself. Here's a quick example: "feverish wind". Instead of saying that, just call it a "gale" or something like that. It will conjure a much more vivid image, and it makes the writing flow much better. You're not being paid by the word here; you don't need to pad this out with extra adjectives.

 

The style here is so grating that it really distracts from the content. It took me several reads through these three sentences before I realized that the phrase "in and out" in the second of these sentences really didn't mean anything. Seriously, in the context of the sentence,what exactly is that phrase supposed to depict? I don't know, but considering that my job is to identify pointless phrases like that, the fact that the writing here is so awkward that I didn't even notice it for a long time is rather telling.

 

It was the dead of night and not even the insects seemed to dare approach this obvious foreigner.

 

See? This here is a good sentence. It flows nicely. It conveys a clear image. It doesn't have an adjective-to-noun ratio of two to one. It uses descriptive nouns like "foreigner" instead of adjective-based constructs like "foreign person". Write more sentences like this one two four four two.

 

He looked around to no avail. Aster looked up at the sky and thought to himself, Wow; such an unbelievable view.

 

Out of the last five sentences, four have used the word "looked" as their verb. The only exception is the insects sentence that I praised above, and that only avoided using the word "looked" because, despite being a good standalone sentence, it wasn't put in the right place. Here's the flow of the paragraph: "Aster searches. Aster searches. Aster searches. Insects do not approach Aster. Aster searches." The insects sentence just feels out of place when its subject is completely different from that of all the surrounding sentences - and yet that's the only thing that saves it from using the word "looked" yet again and increasing the bleeding of my eyes.

 

The fact that the word choice and paragraph arrangement is so painful that I need to mention it over Aster's sudden decision to admire the pretty sky in the middle of his frantic search - and the incredibly awkward way in which this admiring is conveyed to the reader - says something about just how distracting it is.

 

His immediate reaction was to lay down in the soft yet itchy grass,

 

LIE, NOT LAY. LAY IS FOR SETTING DOWN SOMETHING YOUR HOLDING AND REQUIRES AN OBJECT. IT IS A TRANSITIVE VERB, YOU MORON.

 

...did I really just say the phrase "IT IS A TRANSITIVE VERB, YOU MORON" on camera?

 

but he knew better without the "item" he would never be allowed back home. He screamed to the point of straining his voice, "WHY ME?"

 

Seriously, does Aster have the most random mood swings in existence? One moment, he's frantically searching for something; the next moment, he's admiring the pretty sky and thinking about lying down; the next moment, he's doing a bathos-filled anguished scream.

 

Not pictured: believable characterization.

 

All of a sudden something rustled in the bushes behind him. In his haste to turn around he fell and hit his face on a sturdy log.

 

As opposed to all those logs that are so weak that someone tripping and falling on them would shatter the log and leave the person's face unharmed?

 

All right, all right, I'll stop harping on this incredibly awkward overuse of adjectives. You get the idea: the writing style here is painful to read. If I keep interrupting for every stupid construction like this, we'll never get to Chapter 1.

 

...2. 4. 4. 2.

 

His previous comment reared its ugly face back into his mind.

 

"Why are you screaming its the middle of the night," said a shrill voice.

 

No, I didn't mess up in copying the story; the font size and typeface do indeed suddenly change here. No, I don't know why.

 

Rubbing his face Aster looked up. His green eyes

 

Okay, I lied, one last comment about adjectives: you've already established that Aster's eyes are green in the last paragraph. There's no need to remind us of that fact every single time you mention his eyes.

 

widened to the sight of a fox-like creature looking at him. The creature's fur was all white in a thick contrast to the pitch blackness of the night. The creature looked at him in astonishment, "You can see me?" it questioned the red haired youth. Aster didn't answer obviously in shock of what he was seeing. Aster ignored the creature and laid back into the grass covered slopes.

 

Not pictured: believable characterization.

 

"Hey!" the creature called, "I'm talking to you!" Aster continued to ignored the white animal.

 

The creature jumped on his head and Aster fought with the demon for possession of his head, until they fell down the hill that lead to Aster's fairly large home. They hit the brick wall with a large thud and Aster was out cold.

 

Aster ignored the talking animal in favour of lying back and stargazing, so the creature... jumped on his head and attacked him? And this... made them roll down the hill, which is now apparently incredibly steep, and which goes right up to the wall of Aster's home... which is now at the bottom of the hill and yet still so far away that returning without the "item" tonight and coming back to search again tomorrow is unacceptable... and Aster is knocked unconscious by this collision with the wall?

 

Not pictured: believable ANYTHING.

 

I would like to stop here, but I have to keep going. It's the melody. It's not just a bad song. It's a sad song. It enjoys the sorrow I feel when I do these reviews. It resonates with this sadness. It feeds on it. As much as I want to stop, this tune compels me to press on. So here we go:

 

Chapter 1 - Nobody

 

Oh, is this a meta-chapter about the readers?

 

ZING

 

“Wake up insolate boy!” commanded a raspy and energetic voice.

 

..."insolate"? That's... not quite a word.

 

Maybe they mean "insolent", but that doesn't make sense, because the boy in question can't have been being insolent if he was asleep.

 

The brown haired youth that comfortably taken rest upon the lush grass that covered the forest floor had chosen to ignore the raspy voice.

 

it hurts

 

His sleeveless red shirt was ruffled but it looked as it had just been taken out the store in a strange way. Black denim jeans and nice sneakers covered his lower torso. His creamy skin glistened in the mild sunlight that faded through the wide canopy of the forest. He assumed the voice’s owner would go away if he continued to ignore it. But much to his dismay it wouldn’t leave and the pestering began anew. “Boy if you don’t wake your ass up,” the voice continued obviously getting furious with the lazy child.

 

Yes, the voice was obviously getting furious. In fact, it was so obvious that... you felt the need to say it explicitly.

 

The constant badgering of the voice’s owner had no boundary and continued on for a good two minutes before the boy had had enough.

 

You'll note that for all of my stylistic complaints, I've barely even touched on the plot, and that's because, to be honest, the plot has barely existed so far. The story has consisted entirely of these painfully awkward descriptions that make me wish I was reading one of those stories that just says "HERO HAS BROWN HAIR K" and lets me just picture the protagonist as the Jaden clone he inevitably is instead of spending a month assaulting my brain.

 

“LEAVE ME,” the child started and his voice was cut off rather suddenly. His warm gray eyes were stunned at sight he had stumbled upon. Floating before him was something that couldn’t possibly exist. Wings stretched out in front of it a creature about the size of a small child was isolated in mid air in front of the boy. He couldn’t comprehend that what was actually staring at him with beady golden eyes was actually breathing. The beast had the face of a serpent, and a body slim and athletic as a leopard. Its aura demanded respect despite its small stature.

 

Oh, hey, a strange creature that can speak appeared. It's sort of like... that exact same thing that just happened in the prologue. The plot's already getting repetitive before it's even started.

 

“Hey kid you might want to breath,” the beast said.

 

THE VERB BREATHE HAS AN E AT THE END YOU IDIOT

 

“Do you not know what I am?” it asked looking quite puzzled.

 

The boy was frozen and looking words he could use to speak with the beast.

 

DID YOU MEAN LOOKING FOR WORDS? TRY PROOFREADING YOU STUPID IDIOT

 

Its furry body began to descend closer to the ground.

 

YES IT WENT CLOSER TO THE GROUND THAT'S WHAT THE WORD DESCEND MEANS HOW HAVE YOU SURVIVED LONG ENOUGH TO LEARN HOW TO USE THE INTERNET WITHOUT DROWNING IN YOUR OWN SALIVA YOU INCOMPETENT MORON

 

It landed on a rock about a foot tall and looked at the boy while tucking in its marvelous feathered wings in closely to its body as it cocked its head to the side to get a better look at the stunned boy. The scenery around him seemed to match perfectly with the boy’s appearance.

 

Yes, this scenery will not be described, but trust the glowing chimera's sense of aesthetics to assure us that it looked so pretty with the boy that it was worth mentioning. I suppose I should be thankful that we won't need to endure a paragraph about how "The green, large, blanket coverd bed was sitting by the brown oak wood wardrobe next to it that was nearby", but still.

 

In spite of the weird circumstances the creature felt compelled to ask, “What’s your name boy?” his voice a little less harsh but the scratchiness of its voice made it quite evident that it was a male.

 

Of course, because everyone knows how the the voices of serpent-headed chimerae correspond to their genders, right?

 

The boy frozen state of shock began to melt

 

Is there anyone in this story who doesn't respond to unexpected events by becoming completely incapable of moving, speaking, or responding to the event in question? How would these people react if they encountered a lion?

 

Crab: Holy God, a lion!

Aster: Ooh, pretty stars.

Crab: Run, run, run for your life!

Aster: I'm going to lay lie down now.

Crab: It's right on top of you now.

Aster: Nope, don't believe it.

Crab: YOUR LEG IT'S EATING YOUR LEG WHAT A BLOODY MESS DOESN'T THAT HURT!?

Aster: Eh, I must have chosen an uncomfortable place to rest. You know, this grass is soft yet itchy.

 

and as he searched his mind for a name that he would never find. After a couple of agonizing minutes of searching the vaults of his brain it was quite obvious he wouldn’t find an answer. “I don’t know,” he said rather frightened there was no possible answer. The continuous poking around inside of his head revealed he had no idea who he was or rather if he himself was human. Why was he sleeping in the underbrush of the beautiful forest? Why was there a small dragon talking to him as if it was just another casual conversation? He could understand little things like words and knew things that one should know at his. His age, what was it? He couldn’t figure it out at all was he destined to go on living in confusion? So many questions swirled around in his head that it would make any person want to scream.

 

Yes, indeed, this protagonist-with-amnesia cliche does make me want to scream. Giving the protagonist amnesia is a cheap way to avoid giving them any distinguishing traits that could make them an actual interesting character.

 

“You honestly don’t know your own name?” the dragon asked. “How stupid could you get?” he began to laugh a contagious laugh but the nameless boy was in no mood for it.

 

Er, the laugh obviously isn't very contagious if nobody else is laughing. Well, I suppose some readers might laugh, but they're not laughing for the same reason as the serpent-leopard-bird-man-bear-pig-dragon.

 

He was an angered and unknown nobody. Was he destined to go on with his life without knowing who he was?

 

Er, you may have retrograde amnesia, but there has been no indication that you have anterograde amnesia - this isn't Memento, mostly because this is awful whereas Memento is one of the best movies ever made. You'll remember everything from this point onward, which should be plenty to give your life an identity. I mean, nobody remembers what happened before they were about three, but they don't angst over not remembering their origins.

 

The dragon looked at him with sympathy, “Why don’t I name you then kid?” The boy looked at him with annoyance. Why should he have to take a name from a creature that shouldn’t even exist? But he wondered and finally came to the conclusion of it’s better than nothing.

 

“Sure,” he told the creature.

 

Or he could just make up a name for himself? When Buffy lost her memory, she named herself Joan because she decided she felt like a Joan. This kid knows how to speak and has general knowledge of the world, so surely he can come up with names. Why does he need to rely on the dragon here?

 

“Okay, how about Fred?” it began with a flurry of what the soon to be named boy thought would be common names. “Not that one either?” it started, “How about Bartholomew?” With that addition the creature began attacking with names that one would never be caught dead with.

 

...especially since the dragon seems to suck at naming humans in what I assume is meant to be a comedic scene?

 

Then finally a name caught his attention rather quickly, “Cipher?”

 

“That’s it,” he said happily “Cipher, I’ll take that one.” He had an excited and pure voice one that was full of life, something he hadn’t noticed in himself beforehand.

 

Cipher.

 

Because the boy and the author agree that, as Linkara would say, poor literacy is KEWL.

 

“Rather odd choice but I guess you can take it,” the dragon said, “By the way my name is Excalibur.”

 

First of all, you suggested it. Second of all, your name is Excalibur. How exactly are you in a position to criticize the kid's choice?

 

“It’s nice to meet you Cipher,” Excalibur said. “It seems that you think I’m an actual dragon,” the creature said with a joyous expression and a devilish smile.

 

Why do we need to be told every line that both of these characters are filled with happiness and joy? Why would both of these characters be killed with happiness and joy?

 

"I think I'll eat you then!" the dragon began to laugh its deep throaty laugh. "Hahaha, I'm just poking fun," it proclaimed.

 

Great, I tell you to use more inherently descriptive nouns and verbs instead of strings of adjectives, and you respond by using entirely wrong ones. Does that last line look like something you'd see described as "proclaimed"? Absolutely not. That's not a proclamation, so don't pretend it is, you illiterate hack.

 

“I am actually what you people call a Disk Sprite,” he said with a casual tone.

 

“Umm,” Cipher began, “What's a Disk Sprite?”

 

“Well,” Excalibur’s reply was hesitated,

 

There's nothing inherently wrong with the word "said". Using nothing but "said" can be dull, but refusing to use "said" and instead insisting on pulling out an awkward randomly-chosen synonym every sentence makes things much, much worse. The piano's picking up. Na na na na. Na na.

 

“I could just show you.” A smile widened across of its face, “Are you duelist?” Cipher racked his brain, he knew what a duelist was but he wasn’t sure if was one or not. He looked around where he was still situated on the ground, a little to the left was a black and purple jacket. He grabbed the jacket and rummaged through looking for a clue until he came across a stack of about forty brown cards and another stack of cards comprised the extra deck.

 

Mmm, yes, my dear Watson, from this clue I can use my brilliant deductive capabilities to crack this mystery! Elementary!

 

Cipher looked up from the deck he was searching through and said, “I guess so.”

 

“I HAVE FINALLY FOUND YOU!” screamed a harsh and worn out voice that easily cut through the sounds of the rustling bushes as animals dispersed. “EXCALIBUR YOU ARE MINE!” the same voice screamed.

 

Hopefully this indicates that something is actually happening. This story has consisted entirely of an amnesiac chatting with a chimera-dragon-data-thing, which you think would be a recipe for getting something interesting done, but so far we've merely wasted time on shenanigans that I'm sure our author thought would be amusing. ONE. TWO. FOUR. FOUR. TWO.

 

Bushes shifted from out of the way to reveal a fairly tall man. His extremely pale skin was covered in grime and soot (from who knows what). He was dirty from his bald head to his gray and unkempt goatee. His clothes seemed something that royalty would wear not some dirty old man that just shows himself off to a teenage boy and a dragon. Following the old man was a fox with sky bluish tint to its fur. The fox was about a little bigger than a normal sized dog and looked like it could overpower Excalibur,

 

Cipher can tell this because he's an expert in competitive battling between fantasy monsters he never knew existed.

 

but the fox was hesitant as it walked and seemed to be frightened of its surroundings.

 

“Umm,” Cipher said rather uncertain, “Not to be disrespectful but who are you?”

 

The man looked surprised than angry. He proclaimed, “I am Mordy the great Sprite Hunter!”

 

Be careful, Cipher! By merely discarding one card, he can destroy you as long as he rolls a 2, 3, 4, or 5!

 

He pointed towards the fox, “And this is my trusty blade Clarent.”

 

The fox began to shy away from Cipher and Excalibur then said, “N...N...Nice to meet you.”

 

“But now down to business,” the creepy old man began, “You will be coming with me Excalibur.”

 

It's good to see that he's so willing to explain himself to random bystanders for no apparent reason. Also, no matter what you say, he's not creepy. He's loud and violent and obviously evil, but there's nothing creepy about him because he's not at all subtle. He's just a large ham.

 

“No way, this is my master,” Excalibur said nudging towards Cipher. “I won’t be going anywhere with you, creep!” Cipher began to speak to himself, It was rather unnecessary to call him a creep.

 

Yes, the violent shouting man who calls himself a hunter of your kind isn't worth commenting on, but calling that guy a creep? Now, that's just going too far!

 

I swear, every single line of this story just makes things worse. The pain. The agony. The fury. But I must press on. It wants me to. Four. Four. Two.

 

He tried to remember when he agreed to such an agreement. He looked up at Excalibur who seemed to be frightened. He wondered who this man was; his mind was racing as stood up to defend the small dragon who had just given him an identity.

 

“I take it you are a duelist boy,” said Mordy. Cipher shook his head thinking this man unworthy of his words. “That is mighty low of you,” the creep said arrogantly obviously catching Cipher's attempt at disrespect, “Didn’t anyone ever teach you manners.”

 

Wow, this is the lamest confrontation I've ever seen. Our hero's brilliant defiance is... answering nonverbally? And the villain's response is to... question his manners because of this? Forget the data sprites and incredibly important card games; the real fantasy element here is that nobody acts like an actual human being.

 

Cipher wanted to say I have no clue but he decided not to stir up the old man. “How about we make a wager,” he began as he snapped at Clarent. The light blue beast began to glow brightly until it shot itself at Mordy’s arm and there shone a duel disk with such sleek characteristics Cipher believed it to be a blade connected to his arm, “If you can beat me in a duel I’ll allow you and Excalibur to walk free.”

 

Why? I know this sort of thing is standard for the Yu-Gi-Oh! series, but the fact that the alleged creep suggests this as a wager rather than treating it as standard procedure implies that this isn't really standard in this universe. But if it isn't standard, then why not just punch Cipher in the face and take Excalibur?

 

“And what if I lose?” he replied.

 

“Excalibur walks with me,” Mordy replied confidently.

 

Cipher thought for a moment and then looked at Excalibur who looked confident as well and then said, “I trust ya’ kid.”

 

"Don't worry, I have faith in your expertise at using your deck. You know, your deck that you don't remember ever using before. But I trust you because... um... well, we just met today, and you've acted like a moron... actually, can I get someone else to defend me?"

 

Excalibur began to glow and then wrapped around Cipher’s arm when the shine subsided it showed a sleek black version of the revamped battle city duel disk. It’s black and gold design showed Excalibur’s prestige.

 

HOLY GODS IT'S WITH AN APOSTROPHE MEANS IT IS ITS WITHOUT AN APOSTROPHE IS THE POSSESSIVE FORM OF IT YOU CAN'T EVEN SPELL A THREE-LETTER WORD RIGHT WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU YOU STUPID STUPID STUPID STUPID STUPID STUPID STUPID STUPID STUPID STUPID STUPID STUPID STUPID STUPID STUPID STUPID ONE TWO FOUR FOUR TWO ONE TWO FOUR FOUR TWO ONE TWO FOUR FOUR TWO ONE TWO FOUR FOUR TWO

 

Cipher grabbed the deck from his jacket, which was still on the floor and jammed it into the deck holder of the Duel Disk.

 

“Let’s get started,” Cipher smiled, “Shall we?”

 

…TO BE CONTINUED…

 

NO THIS WON'T BE CONTINUED NOT IN MY BOOK THIS IS AWFUL WHY WOULD ANYONE WANT TO READ THIS GARBAGE EVERY SINGLE LINE MAKES ME WANT TO GOUGE MY OWN EYES OUT IT HURTS SO MUCH ANTI-LIFE JUSTIFIES MY HATE IT FEEDS THE SAD SONG IT FEEDS THE SAD SONG!

 

I didn't want to read that chapter. The melody made me. It wanted me to read it. It enjoyed my pain. Everyone enjoys my pain. Well, I've had enough of it, that song isn't right, it's bad and sad and it doesn't belong here and I won't have it.

 

Mother told me they fixed the portal device and used it again today, opening a passage to the same parallel world they tried to reach when they first tested it. But on the other side of the portal, there was nothing. Not a dull world. Not a dead world. Not space. Just blackness and silence and cold. There was nothing there. There could never have been anything there.

 

But this melody slipped out from that nowhere-place, and it won't go back, and it's been tormenting me and controlling me and I've had enough of it. I'm going to boot it out of this dimension and make sure it could never come here.

 

One. Two. Four. Four. Two.

 

 

Doesn't change the fact that there was no reason to ever switch to Comic Sans in the first place.

[Grunt Issun]

You were fast on the new one this time, good work.

[Nathanael D. Striker]

MY EYES!

 

Joking aside, I feel sorry for you. That was just plain awful.

[Brinolovania]

JADEN VON BROWNHAIR RETURNS!!!!

 

Also, my brain hurts...

[Grunt Issun]

I don't know why... but I just remembered someone... he was smart... and had a really awesome name...

OH YEAH! PROFESSOR YOUNG BOY!

[Dr. Cakey]

So...is Cipher...actually Aster? And does that mean...he got amnesia...from...hitting his head...on the wall of his house...?

[Catterjune]

Who cares?

[CrabHelmet]

So...is Cipher...actually Aster? And does that mean...he got amnesia...from...hitting his head...on the wall of his house...?

I didn't even think of that because the setting seemed different and that's a really stupid way of getting amnesia, but considering the story's total lack of quality, it's not impossible. But Pika said it best.

[fireraven23]

You SURE you don't want to review mine? I like seeing famous (You seem kind of famous) people talking about my stuff, whether bad or not.

[CrabHelmet]

GOGOGO SEASON FINALE

 

[spoiler=...The Lord Rested - {Yu-Gi-Oh! Final Matrix}]

There are guards on patrol, but I know where they are without seeing them. There are security cameras all over the area, most of them hidden from sight, but I can tell how to avoid them anyhow. The perimeter fence has a small hole at the bottom near the back, probably dug by a dog, that I've never seen before but already know how to find. The front door has armed guards standing by, but the back door only takes a card swipe and a code typed into a keypad to get in. Before coming to the base, I stole my mother's security card, and though she never told me it, I already know what code to enter.

 

It's one-two-four-four-two.

 

I don't need a map to find my way to the lab. The song tells me where to go. And when I arrive there, it's empty. I wonder if Melody arranged for it to be empty. That's what it is at this point. It's not just a melody. It's Melody. It's a tune, but it's also more than that. It has its own identity. It wants things. It eats things. It's alive.

 

And I think it wants to go home.

 

I disable the alarms so that we won't be disturbed, then turn my attention to what I know is the dimensional portal machine. The coordinates they used for the test that brought Melody here are already set, so all I need to do is switch it on, and Melody will be able to return to her own world. So I do so, and before my eyes, a portal forms in the pristine white wall of the laboratory. And on the other side of the portal is... nothing.

 

It isn't space on the other side of the portal. There isn't any sort of space there at all. It isn't what you'd call black, though there is a complete absence of light that makes it seem even darker than that - so dark it feels strange to look at. No barrier is blocking the portal; I could step through if I wanted to. But there isn't anything there to step into. It's not so much an empty place as it is a non-place. We don't really have words to describe it properly because everywhere in our universe is a place that exists. Our language has never had a need to handle a place that just plain isn't.

 

The Initiative had considered the first test of the machine a failure, and I could see why now: they must have seen what I was seeing now, seen just how wrong the other side of the portal was, and concluded that they hadn't established contact with the other universe as intended. But they were wrong about that. The device worked perfectly. They had established contact with this other world just fine. The only problem was that the world didn't seem to exist. Maybe it had once existed, but there's nothing there now, and nothing other than Melody to suggest that anything has ever been there; in a certain sense, even if it once previously had existed, it now has never existed. There isn't even really a "there" - that would imply a location, some sort of space, and there is no space at all. It is now gone and was never there and has never been there and there isn't even a "there" left for it to ever have been anyhow.

 

And yet Melody was still able to escape somehow.

 

And since I can still hear the na-na-na-nas in my head, Melody isn't satisfied with opening the portal to this non-place.

 

I type random numbers into the portal machine and try again. Maybe, even if it wouldn't go home, Melody would go to some other dimension I could open. But it's no use. Portals appear to a jungle, a spaceship, something vaguely resembling Victorian England, a stone building of some sort, and several other locations that I don't even bother looking at, one at a time. But the music keeps playing in my head. Melody isn't going away.

 

Turning away in frustration, something on the far end of the lab draws my attention.

 

It is clearly an unfinished device, an indistinct mishmash of wires and spare parts sitting beside a pile of some illegibly-written notes, but I know instinctively what it was: an unfinished time machine. And I also instinctively know how to finish it.

 

As you know, the war with the European Union was started when the Tea Party gained enough power in the government that they were able to authorize the assassination of Pope Frederick II on the grounds that, in their eyes, he was either the Anti-Christ or an agent thereof. Unfortunately, their assassin was caught, and so the whole EU was brought to war with America, either from their own religious zeal or out of fear that America would feel free to assassinate anyone they felt like or due to alliance with the first two groups. The Initiative was founded by President Biden to provide a solution through unconventional branches of science to a war we weren't sure we could win. The dimensional portal was supposed to be used to forge alliances with advanced alternate Americas, but it seems that time-travel is another option they're exploring - perhaps to prevent the original assassination and stop the whole war from ever beginning.

 

Since I know how to finish the time machine, I assume Melody wants me to finish it. And I think I can guess how she wants me to use it. Everything falls into place as a put the machine together. When it's done, I turn it on and have it send me back in time to my destination.

 

But time-travel seems to be slow. I don't immediately land when I want to. I have experiences while traveling - it feels like time is passing for me, but that's rather a confusing way of putting it given my current situation. Suffice to say, I can do something before landing, and if I don't do something, I'll be rather bored here.

 

I don't know what "today" is while I'm traveling; I don't think it's even right to call it a day, or a night, or anything like that. Nevertheless, I still think I can say one thing with confidence: Today is a day for Foe Fiction.

 

Here, we have "Yu-Gi-Oh! Final Matrix", a story by the immortal DARK GAIA Necromancer:

 

Hello YCM, this is my first fanfic so plz comment and criticise

 

Prolouge

 

Oh, don't worry, CAPS LOCK Necromancer. I'd be happy to "criticise" your "Prolouge". Can you guess what my first criticism is? (Hint: It starts with a "Y" and ends with a "ou can't spell".)

 

10000 years ago

 

Why does everyone insist on creating a new backstory set increasingly ridiculously large numbers of years in the past? Ten thousand years ago, humans were maybe just barely beginning to transition from hunting and gathering into farming, but everyone acts like they can just stamp whatever year they want on their story and people will be pretty much like they were in medieval Europe except with magic.

 

in a far off land known as Necrovallio

 

The land was founded by the renowned Lord Sucky McFailname and his wife, the Lady Eyebleeding McFailname...

 

lived the Necromancer's;

 

...though her maiden name was Eyebleeding O'Misuseofapostrophes.

 

a group of spellcasters who used their power to help people in need.

 

I'm seriously getting flashbacks to that other story about the Kaze Minzoku or Kaze Maneko or whatever those Wind Cat People were called. That, too, had a backstory set obnoxiously far in the past and revolved around a race that apparently all had the same moral alignment.

 

See, here's the thing: People suck. Humans, by and large, are selfish, greedy, deceitful, and generally less than virtuous in a variety of ways. To expect us to believe that every single member of this group is of the Lawful Perfect alignment is unreasonable. If the group is not opt-in and consists solely of everyone born in Stupidnamevalley, then you're denying basic human nature, and if the group is opt-in, then you're asking us to believe that only truly good people decided to seek power. Neither of these is believable, so when you insist that they are true, I try to rationalize it by assuming that we're missing an important piece of information, and that piece of information is generally "brainwashing dystopia".

 

All was peaceful for years until the Matrix Monsters attacked; they were created for evil

 

By whom? If everything was so perfect and everyone was so good, who decided to create them for evil?

 

to destroy Necrovallio.

 

Why? I know it's just the "prolouge", but some semblance of character or motivation would be welcome here.

 

When the Emperor of Necrovallio was brainwashed

 

So brainwashing is plausible in this universe? Consider my earlier suspicion confirmed.

 

Since you haven't explained who created the "Matrix Monsters" or why they wanted to destroy "Necrovallio", here's my theory: the Necromancers were oppressive brainwashing dictators, but one poor sap finally managed to break free of their brainwashing, perhaps while scouting the area around the valley and thus being far from the oppressors' power base. Realizing what had been done to her, she vowed to take down the Necromancers to free all the innocent civilians from their control. But she herself had little power compared to them, and returning to the valley would allow them to brainwash her again, so she studied long and hard to build herself an army to fight for her. When she was ready, they returned and managed to free the Emperor, who was merely a puppet, from the controllers' brainwashing.

 

The version of the story we're seeing here is a propaganda piece by the Necromancers. After all, would you expect an objective portrayal of this conflict by someone whose name contains the word "Necromancer"?

 

Necromancer's were left defenceless.

 

Really? An army of spellcasters are completely defenseless without their emperor? An army of spellcasters who, based on their name, ought to be much stronger in a war situation with all the deaths occurring (though I'm not sure if these so-called Necromancers actually practice necromancy; as far as we can see so far, they're just generic spellcasters who were misnamed by an author who just thinks the word "Necromancer" sounds cool), is completely powerless without one single leader's presence?

 

This really is like that Wind Cat People story - the heroes, in addition to being potentially brainwashing dictators, are incredibly incompetent.

 

After years of war, the Necromancer's were unfortunately defeated but a few years after the Matrix Monsters died out.

 

...and then everyone lived in freedom. HAPPY END

 

95000 years later...

 

Wait, you said the prologue took place only 10000 years ago. This really highlights how arbitrary these year numbers are - even the author can't be bothered to remember which number he decided to write down.

 

Well, according to this, we're now somewhere around the year 87000, which means that the God-Emperor has been fighting the Chaos Gods for over fifty thousand years by the time this story takes place. So, what's the world like now?

 

In New Domino City lived a boy named Draco Gaia; he wore a white t-shirt with dark blue jeans. He was a duelist; a Duel Monsters enthusiast who challenged people to duels using card

 

Little did Draco know that his life was about to change...

 

Oh, I see, it's exactly like it was in 5D's. I guess not a lot of technological development occurred in the last eighty-five thousand years.

 

And look, our protagonist, like the great heroes of the past, is named after the author. I foresee nothing but good things. It's worth noting at this point that the authors signature says "I am the one true master of the Necromancers" in giant red letters with only one or two words per line (which, combined with a terrible custom card he made and also put in his signature, makes his signature about one and a half times as tall as my computer screen), so I am definitely not reading too much into this - this is absolutely self-insertion.

 

1st chapter will be up as soon as I finish it

 

Oh, I believe that. It's very obvious that no post-production work goes into this story. There's no editing, no proofreading, no spellchecking; there is only throwing words on a page and throwing it up on line as soon as possible, even though it sucks.

 

Let's go on to this first chapter:

 

"I never knew about the Necromancers until I met him, if I didn't I would of never known that I was the last one; the last Necromancer..."

 

3 days earlier...

 

Or maybe 12442 days earlier. Numbers are fluid in this story.

 

But more importantly is this opening quote. Starting with a single scene in the middle of the story and then jumping back to the beginning of events is a very common trope in fiction, especially in modern television but dating back to the ancient Greeks (though they generally started with more than a single scene), as a way to hook the reader into the plot. The problem is that it needs to actually hook the reader into the story.

 

Generally, the opening scene shows something exciting happening that we really want to see, or something weird happening that we want to see explained. What it shouldn't do is just provide one spoilerific line of exposition. We want to see how Mal ended up stranded naked in the desert. We want to see how Odysseus ended up alone on the island of Calypso. We want to see why Starbuck's viper is crashing in a dust storm. We want to see why Superman is being a git on the cover of every Silver Age comic ever. But we don't want to see how Draco found out that he was the Chosen Stu. We know he's the Chosen Stu, and the manner by which he became the Chosen Stu really isn't of any interest.

 

Now, the author wrote this with Draco's Chosen Stu-ness in mind, and we're expected to read this story with that at the front of our thoughts, but I want you to pretend you had never heard of the Necromancers (let's call them "Necromanstues" from now on) and read these next few lines without that frame of reference guiding your interpretation of them:

 

Draco was just duelling in the park, like he normally did. When the duel had finished, a strange man wearing a long black coat and an metal mask covering his face walked up to him and started whispering quietly to him "Come with me, Draco." he whispered as Draco waited until his friends were gone before he went with the man.

 

"Who are you?" asked Draco but the man didn't answer.

 

...wow.

 

...WOW.

 

Is anyone else getting the same overtones from this that I am?

 

They walked for ages until they reached to a stone wall at the edge of the park.

 

"This is where I parked my van," said the man. "Hop inside. I've got lots of yummy candy."

 

"Stand back, it's going to get bumpy from here." explained the man.

 

o_O

 

I'm not even going to touch this line. In fact, I'm pretty sure that a lack of touching is what this story desperately needs.

 

We see here that Draco is indeed a perfect stand-in for our author in the sense that Draco, like our author, is much too dumb to live. Kids, let me make something clear: if a strange man that you don't know who wears a large coat and a facemask approaches you in the park and starts whispering to you to come with him, RUN LIKE HELL. Don't send your friends away and then walk with him somewhere where you'll be alone together. Did Draco miss all the stuff about strangers that they drill into your head throughout your entire childhood?

 

Granted, we know this guy is leading Draco to his Necromansuetiful destiny, but Draco doesn't know that. For all Draco knows, this guy is exactly what he appears to be, and Draco will soon be raped and murdered, not necessarily in that order. And I will have no sympathy for him because, as horrible a fate as that is, we really don't need his stupidity corrupting the gene pool. Give the idiot a Darwin award for so graciously decreasing the surplus population, and maybe have his parents killed for having some combination of awful genes and awful parenting skills.

 

The man placed his hand onto the wall, suddenly the ground started to shake and the wall erupted with a blinding green light.

 

"WHAT THE HELL IS HAPPENING." Draco couldn't believe it, he thought nothing like this is possible but, he was wrong.

 

Oh, believe me, Draco is wrong about a lot more things than this.

 

"THE PROPHESY, THATS WHAT." the man shouted over the noise of the earth rumbling.

 

Suddenly the wall started opening up revealing a stairway leading underground.

 

Er, no, I'd say that what's happening is "The wall is opening to reveal a stairway leading underground". That's a good answer to the question of what is happening. "THE PROPHESY, THATS WHAT", in addition to being as ungrammatical as everything else in this story, is a terrible answer.

 

This was making Draco even more confused.

 

"Seriously, who the he'll are you." questioned Draco.

 

THE PROPHESY, THATS WHO

 

Also, do we really need to do that thing where we substitute random awkward verbs for "said" and "asked" that are supposed to make us look more imaginative but only make every sentence go clunk?

 

This is seriously painful. Na. Na na. Na na-na na. Na na-na na. Do do.

 

"That will become clear soon." the man answered who was getting really bored of answering these questions

 

But he hasn't answered any questions, and the questions are more than reasonable. This guy is lucky the kid in question was sufficiently retarded to go with him in the first place instead of running like anyone who remembered Stranger Danger.

 

They walked inside, as they passed the entrance, the entrance closed inwards making the light around the cave become total darkness. Suddenly the walls lit with ominous green light.

 

This would probably have looked really cool if it were on a television screen. But you're not writing television, you're writing a purely text-based story, so all of this just falls flat.

 

The spent a few minutes walking until they finally got to the bottom of the stairway which lead to a room in total darkness.

 

The man clicked his fingers and light lit the room.

 

"what in the name of the crimson dragon is going on, what the hell do you want with me and..." but, the man interrupted.

 

THE PROPHESY, THATS WHAT

 

"Now for the explaining." explained the man.

 

"I'm so tired of answering your annoying questions, so I'll respond by... answering all questions."

 

"10000 years ago

 

Or 95000 years ago. Let's compromise and say 47500 years ago.

 

there was a secret organisation called the Necromancer's who used magic and spells to help the people of the land." he continued to explain.

 

First of all, he's not continuing to explain, he's starting to explain. Using the words "said" and "asked" all the time may not be very imaginative, but while those words aren't very colorful, they also don't leap off the page and assault the reader with how out-of-place they are.

 

Second of all, they obviously weren't a secret organization given that the land was named after them and they had an emperor. Unless they were brainwashing everyone to forget about them, which seems quite likely to me.

 

Third of all, the continued references to generic "magic and spells" makes me more and more convinced that these "Necromancers" have nothing to do with actually performing magic related to the dead and are in fact just general wizards who chose a name that the author thought was cool but didn't understand. Come on, look at the roots. "NECRO" = DEATH. Learn some Greek, you moron. Or just get kidnapped by a child molester and die.

 

Fourth of all, if we're going to be given all this backstory exposition again, what was the point of the prologue? Just put all the exposition here and cut out the prologue; it's completely redundant.

 

"But, what does that have anything to me?" asked Draco while he was getting really confused.

 

YE GODS YOU DON'T NEED TO REPEAT THAT DRACO IS CONFUSED EVERY SINGLE LINE I HATE THIS STORY I HATE IT I HATE IT I HATE IT SO MUCH THAT I'M NOT EVEN GOING TO SAY THE PROPHESY THATS WHAT BECAUSE I HATE IT SO MUCH

 

"For god sake, just listen for once." shouted the man who was really sick of Draco and his constant questioning.

 

That's it, I'm pretty sure this script was written by a computer. The algorithm works something like this:

 

"[Generic question about the situation]", [Randomly selected synonym for "said"] Draco [reference to his ever-rising confusion].

 

"[Content-free non-answer]", [Randomly selected synonym for "said"] the man [reference to how annoyed he's getting at Draco's questions despite the fact that the questions are really obvious basic ones and he hasn't asked very many and it was unspeakably stupid to come with the man without asking anything in the first place].

 

Seriously, this exact exchange has been repeated three times in a row now. I feel like the author wrote the dialogue by having three groups of people play the same game of Mad Libs.

 

"All except one Necromancer was killed by the Matrix Monsters.. I am that one; I'm a Necromancer but there was one more who is the only descendent of the master,

 

No.

 

I know it's common in fiction for there to be exactly one descendant of some ancient figure, but that's just not how things work in the real world. It's been proven that a family line, after only a few generations, either dies out entirely or multiplies wildly to have a ridiculous number of descendents. After XX000 years, "the master" (who, based on his name and the Necromanstues' penchant for brainwashing, I'm assuming is played by Roger Delgado or Anthony Ainley or John Simm) would either have had no descendents for literally uncounted millennia or have most of the world's population as descendents.

 

You only get exactly one descendent if you only count the firstborn legitimate son as a proper descendent, but even that doesn't work because it is vanishingly unlikely that the firstborn legitimate son would survive, marry, and have a son in every single generation for an uncertain number of thousands of years. Not to mention that it represents a patriarchal worldview that doesn't match what we'd expect to see XX000 years ago.

 

I was given the task to find him so I performed the ultimate spell which gave me immortality

 

"Come to think of it, maybe the others would have survived the war if they'd also made themselves immortal. Oops, I guess we didn't think of that."

 

until in find the last one and that my annoying friend is you, Draco Gaia."

 

Er... why? Why is it Draco Gaia and not his father, or his father, or anyone in the line of descent between "the master" and Draco? Was this guy searching for the last #$000 years and completely failing the whole time? Or did he only spring into action now by realizing that Draco was clearly too dumb to love and had probably already succeeded in accidentally castrating himself, ensuring that Draco would be the end of the family line?

 

he continued to explain sounding not so sure but, he knew it was true.

 

YES WE KNOW HE'S EXPLAINING BECAUSE HE WAS SPEAKING AND THE WORDS HE WAS SPEAKING FORMED AN EXPLANATION AND WHY IS HE UNSURE BUT ALSO CERTAIN THAT IT'S TRUE THAT MAKES NO SENSE THAT. MAKES. NO. SENSE.

 

Just as the man finished speaking a solid gold pedestal a deck of cards on it rose slowly out the ground and the man edged Draco towards it.

 

Okay, we're back to the child molestation again. Draco, don't let him force you to touch his golden deck. Scream and run and find a responsible authority figure. What would Sonic say about someone trying to initiate touching in an uncomfortable way or place?

 

 

"This is your new deck, it has Necromancer's whose spirits were captured by Matrix Monsters and made into cards, some of them are of the Necromancer beasts who were used in the great war but, that's another story." The man added as he gave Draco the deck

 

"They're just regular spellcasters with no connection to zombies, because this was written by a seven-year-old hack who doesn't know what words mean."

 

"But, why me." but when Draco asked, no one was there.

 

Suddenly green light enveloped Draco and at a blink of an eye he was outside the cave.

 

Over the next couple of days Draco thought about what happened, he knew he would see the man again. The main thing he knew was the world was about to change...

 

Wait, so nothing happened over the last three days? You just had three days pass in order to say at the start that three days had passed?

 

At the start of this chapter, we were teased with the knowledge that Draco was the Chosen Stu, and in the body of the first chapter, we learned that... Draco was the Chosen Stu. And a moron. And the other immortal Necromanstu is also a moron. The whole chapter was pretty much an utter waste of the reader's time in terms of things that happened in the story, and that's saying something since this story itself is already a waste of time.

Oh, and changing the backstory really didn't have any effect on the plot. The Egyptian wizards are now "Necromancers", Zorc's armies are now "Matrix Monsters", and the events of the past have been pushed back somewhere between 7000 and 92000 years, but there's no real change in substance. You could just as easily have made Draco a descendent of the Pharaoh, and the only real difference would be that the names wouldn't be so stupid. In fact, keeping the old backstory would make the "last descendent" thing make more sense - after all, while someone can have multiple descendents, there can only really be one rightful heir to the Pharaoh's throne.

 

So, that was our story. That story is bad. That story sucked. That is terrible by pretty much every metric. What does my guest star have to say about that?

 

 

...I'm really not sure how you can be with my while I'm time-traveling, Sonic. I dunno, maybe you run just that fast?

 

Speaking of which, I seem to be here. Or, rather, I seem to be now. The Initiative. The lab. 4 AM. The morning of the first test of the dimensional portal device.

 

Nobody should be around at this hour, so all I need to do is smash the machine to pieces and-

 

"Er, what are you doing here, ambiguously-gendered person?"

 

Blast. Some old scientist. Figures there'd be someone working late. Look, I'm here to stop the test of the dimensional portal.

 

"A saboteu-"

 

No! I'm from the future! I got here by the time machine you're going to event. The dimensional portal test had disastrous results, so it needs to be stopped for the good of the world.

 

"Disastrous results? What happened?"

 

Er, I got a song stuck in my head.

 

"..."

 

No, no, but it's evil! And alive! And wrong! And it eats pain and is wrong and shouldn't be here and guided me here so that I could send it home to a world that doesn't exist by preventing it from ever having come here in the first place! I'm going to make it better.

 

"...look, even if that weren't completely crazy, our calculations say that changing the past, if not impossible, is a very bad thing. Either you can't do it at all, or doing so would create a paradox in the universe that would make all of realit-"

 

I pick up a nearby hammer and start smashing the machine.

 

"No! Don't, you can't!"

 

I pick up a nearby hammer and start smashing the machine.

 

"No! Don't, you can't!"

 

I pick up a nearby hammer and start smashing the machine. "Er, what are you doing here, ambiguously-gendered person?" THE PROPHESY, THATS WHAT "Disastrous results? What happened?" to make it better better better better better BETTER OHHHHHHH

NA

NA NA

NA NA-NA NA

NA NA-NA Not pictured: believable characterization. First of all, take a drink for a logo that tries to make it look more like an actual televised series... Thanks to their brilliant brainwashing program, nobody deviated from the officially mandated thought process for hundreds of years. Ah, yes, the great philosopher Immanuel "Short-Fruit" pKant. Because if the Yeerks find us, then oh gods a horrifying thought just occurred to me - what if Jakeup is supposed to be named Jacob, and Clause is just too stupid to spell Jacob? "That's one of the most powerful cards in all of-" never mind, I'd rather be making more slash jokes than quoting the Abridged Series. So let's get started, shall we?

 

 

 

 

 

The only problem was that the world didn't seem to exist. Maybe it had once existed, but there's nothing there now, and nothing other than Melody to suggest that anything has ever been there; in a certain sense, even if it once previously had existed, it now has never existed. There isn't even really a "there" - that would imply a location, some sort of space, and there is no space at all. It is now gone and was never there and has never been there and there isn't even a "there" left for it to ever have been anyhow.

 

And yet Melody was still able to escape somehow.

 

So, I have two questions. First, what do people think of the storyline stuff; do they like it or want me to stop doing it? Second, do you want to see other commentators in colored text return? The answers will determine what I do from here on.

 

You SURE you don't want to review mine? I like seeing famous (You seem kind of famous) people talking about my stuff, whether bad or not.

Your story doesn't fit my style. If you've read my reviews, you'll know that I really don't like commenting on duels, since I really find pretty much all of them boring and there isn't a whole lot of unique comments to be made. I even cut off some of my reviews at the point where the duel starts because after that I get more bored than ever and don't have much of interest to say. Your story is about a paragraph of exposition followed by a wall-of-text duel, so there's no way I'm touching that.

[.Rai]

Another fine review.

 

I think it's perfectly fine to comment on the storyline. The storyline is the core of the story and if it has a problem, then the fiction is fundamentally wrong.

 

If you mean your storyline, I don't mind either way.

 

More than 1 commentator is also quite fun to read.

[Hydra of Ages]

Your plotlines are always a refreshing intermission. While we came here to see stunningly bad works of fiction (and you tearing them to shreds), sometimes it's important to be reminded that not everyone on the internet is completely creatively bankrupt.

 

That said, the usage of the word 'Necromancer' here is utterly bizarre. Did he legitimately not know what it means, or did he think it would be 'edgy' to... use a term incorrectly? Bah. A kingdom of Lawful Good necromancers who never thought to abuse their powers in any way is funny enough in any case.

[.Rai]

I think probably most people picked up on that. Probably, he's heard it somewhere; couldn't be bothered to find out what the root meant; and then just use it because it sounds cool.

 

Edit: Strike that, my new theory is that he just wanted to name them after himself.

 

DARK GAIA Necromancer (the author) = Conveniently named necromancers.

[Synchronized]

Lmao, a year later you reference my story. I find that hilarious, and in another review no less.

 

That was awful; YCM has a built in spell-check feature, how can you possibly have that many spelling errors?

 

The story stuff seems to add to it, really.

[Catterjune]

So, I have two questions. First, what do people think of the storyline stuff; do they like it or want me to stop doing it?

Personally speaking, I'm not a fan. The updates come few and far between so I'd often have to re-read because I forgot a lot of the details, and I'm a lazy hoe so I end up not re-reading.

 

Not a fan of ignoring it until the season is over and then reading them all at once, because I'll never do that. I don't like reading 10,000+ word documents all at once. Even when reading for school I tend to do other things at the time.

 

I'm sure some plenty of people like it, and I don't think it detracts from the story or anything (since I can just skip all of it), so... w/e.

[PikMan]

...I'm really not sure how you can be with my while I'm time-traveling, Sonic. I dunno, maybe you run just that fast?

(poofs in) Of course Sonic can time travel! He just keeps running by Past and Future posts.

 

...Oh right, I'm supposed to be in self-exile. Sorry! (poofs out)

[Nathanael D. Striker]

...

 

What did I just read?

[Dr. Cakey]

Sonic ran around the Earth, causing time to go backwards.

 

...wait, or is that Superman.

 

I am, like, addicted to this storyline. But...do you have a thing for destroying the space-time continuum or something? You may want to talk to a psychiatrist about that.

[Niv-Mizzet]

Little vocabulary lesson for DARK GAIA Necromancer: Necro=death, mancer=mage, diviner, something along those lines. Therefore, their title is literally "death mage". Now how that translates to "helping people and defending the almighty powers of justice, friendship, and card games", I have no idea. More like slaying all in sight, then zombifying their corpses.

[Phantom Roxas]

You also seem to have like having other characters be you, since the ending seems to strongly imply that you are Melody.

 

Since I'm ripping you and Linkara off by having a storyline and using guest characters in Phantom's Divinations, I'm happy that you have a story and would like to see it continue.

[PikMan]

...

 

What did I just read?

(poofs in again) Turn to page 26 and read "In The Land That Our Grandchildren Knew" for the start of the story.

 

Oh, and Crab, feel free to have me pull a stunt like this if you do another review. That is all. (poofs out)

[Catterjune]

Second, do you want to see other commentators in colored text return?

 

I just realized no ones answered this question yet.

 

... Commentators, not a fan. Since everyone on YCM likes to suck your jaggon it'll just be a hundred and one "I agree with Crab Helmet!" citations.

 

I've tried reading other serialized Mystery Science Theater ripoffs. Phantom Divinations was about 20 percent jabroniing about style, 50 percent minor nitpicking (with some overlap between the two), and 30 percent actually discussing what's fundamentally wrong with the story.

 

Growing Praise was 60 percent minor nitpicking and 30 percent jabroniing about style, with the rest as an actual review.

 

(Don't ask me where I got the numbers from)

 

So yeah, since those are the only commentors I can immediately think up off the top of my head and I'm already feeling like I'm scrapping the bottom of the barrel I can't really imagine them adding much to the MST-ing.