Lurker > Giggsalot

if anything I think it's better than his habit of descending from on high as a quasi-deus ex machina in every single final case, at least it suggests he works for a living between international crises
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yeah, definitely. I kind of rolled my eyes at the way they railroaded Larry and Edgeworth into the case initially, but the dialogue has been excellent and there's been a really entertaining nostalgia about having the gang back together. I wouldn't really want a fan-service-heavy case like this in the "main" series, I don't think, but as a bonus it's pretty perfect really.
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side note: started playing the AA6 DLC case last night, this is a lot of fun! I get the sense that this isn't going to be a objectively brilliant case, but investigating with Maya was an awesome throwback and all the Larry stuff in the trial has been hysterically funny. still a long way to go, but this feels like exactly the kind of entertaining nonsense that DLC cases are perfect for.
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well, uh, that was a hell of a case! will need time to process my overall feelings, but I'm happy to answer any questions people have. stray thoughts:

- I agree with SD that the case kind of peaked early - the realization that Dhurke is already dead is enormous and the clear climax of the game, and everything after Amara gets shot is fairly perfunctory. however, with the final Ga'ran twist the case ended in a satisfying way, unlike 5-5, and didn't outstay it's welcome, unlike E1-5. so good job to the writers on that one!

- this was two really good cases in one, which obviously strengthens the case overall, but I'm not sure I like the decision overall. why not split them up (and make 6-2 or 6-4 DLC if necessary)? in a way, I feel like the current setup overshadows the Buff murder, which I really enjoyed and deserved a 3-4-esque standalone presentation. I genuinely think Armie Buff and Paul Atishon are two of the most memorable characters in the game, and it's hard to even remember they were in this case by the end! I also feel this validates my approach of considering 5-4 and 5-5 one single case, but that's another story.

- "her benevolence has taken to calling me braid head" is one of the best credits lines yet, I think. it's actually pretty impressive how believable and likable nahyuta's transformation was, considering how tedious his characterization was at times throughout the game.

- the Lamiroir tease at the end of the game was a fun nod. I wouldn't have a problem with Apollo re-appearing in a cameo capacity from here on, especially in a case that was related to Trucy and Thalassa (though knowing the writers they'll probably only find out the truth after she gets viciously murdered), but I like that he'll (presumably) be mostly gone from here on. because AA4 was such a letdown as far as Apollo's characterization, his character feels maybe comparable to Phoenix post AA2, and his leaving and taking on so much responsibility feels slightly premature. the dude is only 24 years old! but it was a nice conclusion to his story arc, and I like the theme of mentors and disciples that came through most of the game, and Phoenix really coming into his role as an elder statesman. if the next game (trilogy?) is Athena-focused, I hope they can continue to emphasize that aspect of his character, so he truly does continue to grow and progress as the endgame monologue suggests.

- is the DLC case worthwhile? I heard it's a bit of a let-down in comparison to 5-6, but I hurt my ankle yesterday and so I'll need something lazy to do!
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finished the trial now! glad that didn't run on too long.

gonna finish up the closing now and then give some thoughts.
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...and we're at the Jove Justice divination seance! no major shocks so far - Rayfa being Amara and Dhurke's daughter qualifies as a big deal, but I thought that was fairly obvious from the first time we saw the photo. Ga'ran's surely running relatively low on hail marys now, so will be interested to see how long she can stall this out. I hope she doesn't pull an Alba on us.
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holy shit Amara got shot

this does seem to clear the road for Amara to be relatively innocent and Ga'ran to be the perpetrator of pretty much everything, as initially suspected, but that doesn't mean we'll be doing it any time soon. I'm not sure how many more twists this case can have, but I'd be crazy to predict that everything is clear now.

(okay, so I played on a bit. stopping here now, honestly!)
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alright, thanks a lot. it's 11pm here, would rather not be puzzling over this in four hours.

got to the unofficial Dhurke exoneration, and pausing on the Amara perceive. normally these things are fine, but this one seems Brushel-level.

will probably finish this off tomorrow, stay tuned!
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can anyone tell me approximately how long I have left in this case? at Amara's second testimony now, and I might actually pause here if there's a substantial amount left (we haven't even touched on the arson yet, so I suspect there might be)
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it's funny, because I remember thinking earlier in the game that it was kind of disappointing that the game was making it so obvious that Inga would be the big bad/final murderer. at the start of this case I was genuinely shocked by his death, but in the end it turns out that i was more or less right all along.

that is emotionally manipulative, sick, wonderful storytelling.
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this case is horrendous
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oh god i'm right aren't i
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time for another utterly batshit theory that I don't really believe: we've never seen Nayna/Amara and Dhurke together in this case - Dhurke's escape from the trial coincided with Nayna's entrance, and we'd never seen her before now. what if 6-5 Dhurke was actually being channeled by Amara the whole time, and she just stayed in his body since the murder?

this would, of course, raise a number of questions, like "wait, Dhurke's dead?" and "when did that happen? and "what is Dhurke's blood doing in the tomb?" as well as, of course, "what the utter fuck?"

...but, you know, still!
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Giggsalot posted...

- crackpot theory time! I don't think I believe this, but I'm going to throw this out here now, just in case: ever since we first saw Amara, I've been fairly convinced that she and Nayna might somehow be the same person. it doesn't really make any sense on a number of levels, but their colour schemes are just eerily similar, and we know so little about Nayna that it can't really be discounted.

ohoho! glad I posted this when I did, the thought had rumbled around in my head without any real basis for ages. I'll be wrong about almost everything in this case, I think, but I'm glad I got this one.

as of Amara's testimony, I'm still fairly convinced that it's all Ga'ran's doing - the way she's played off Dhurke against Amara to take the blame is perfect crime territory - but the way that Amara seems to be very much on her side here is intriguing to say the least.

I suspect there is a long, long way to go here yet.

p.s. Amara's "patron saint of animals" animation is amazing
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played a little more 6-5 tonight, decided to pause at the break before Maya takes the stand.

not much to ponder at the moment, but some assorted thoughts:

- current speculated timeline: someone (Nayna?) murders Inga dressed up as Dhurke, goes to Inga's house, loses hat to dog, and forces Maya to channel Inga's spirit, which then rushes to the tomb. he then maybe sees his own corpse, breaks down, leaves Maya's body. but then what? Dhurke could have conceivably blacked out in the tomb from illness alone, and nothing else happened, but why did Maya then claim he "saved" her?

- is it genuinely possible that the queen isn't the big bad here? I find it hard to believe - she had a motive for both crimes, and is also flagrantly evil. but she seems to have a genuine alibi for the murder, albeit a suspicious one, and her demeanor at the moment isn't as defensive as I would expect.

- crackpot theory time! I don't think I believe this, but I'm going to throw this out here now, just in case: ever since we first saw Amara, I've been fairly convinced that she and Nayna might somehow be the same person. it doesn't really make any sense on a number of levels, but their colour schemes are just eerily similar, and we know so little about Nayna that it can't really be discounted.

will try to finish this off at the weekend! feel free to ask any questions that come to mind at this point.
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so, got up to Inga's divination seance. long, long way to go, i suspect! still, some thoughts:

- I have no idea how they're gonna cover both these crimes here in the same trial. will it be like 1-4, where we prove Dhurke innocent of Inga's murder without implicating someone else, and then move on to the arson for the slam dunk? don't tell me, obviously; it's just tough to foresee.

- Ga'ran's prosecutorial style seems to be pure hubris, none of our arguments so far have held any water and yet we're still here because she's bored. her court presence is the closest the games have come to recreating Manfred von Karma, but her strategy is Franziska-level silly. which is probably just as well, since she can have us decapitated whenever she likes.

- thinking about it, I don't see any way this case makes sense without the sarcophagus acting as a passageway. I still can't see past Ga'ran as murderer, which makes the most likely scenario that she dressed in Dhurke-esque clothes, killed Inga, and escaped via the passageway. but then what's the deal with Nayna? who is she? where is she? if any of that's not true, by the way, I'm almost entirely out of ideas. I don't think I've been this far along in a case without understanding any of it since 3-5.

- I did work out one thing in this trial, at least - the Khura'in royal family name puns! queen anger indeed.
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not to confuse the narrative here, but wow the 6-5 second trial day didn't waste any time. wasn't expecting that ga'ran transformation for a long time! this is going to be goooood.

(probably won't be able to play that much tonight, but will provide some thoughts over the next hour or so)
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LeonhartFour posted...

reading people's 6-5 theories is consistently entertaining because the possible permutations are seemingly endless

In that case...!

Had a new epiphany this morning: now that we have Jove's face and name, we'll almost certainly give him a divination seance at some point. That could be the "evidence" we need to crack the arson case. I wonder if that's Dhurke's plan, and why he tracked the photo down so rigorously. Would be poetic for a divination seance to bring down the regime too.

I could also imagine Dhurke being responsible for Jove's death, and taking on Apollo out of guilt. But i'm not sure how that could work with what i said above. Let's see!
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Giggsalot posted...

- the queen has to be the mastermind between both crimes. it would seem fairly absurd for her to be physically murdering people herself (surely she has people for that), but I can't see any other suspect. if there's nothing in the sarcophagus, I wonder if she could enter/exit the tomb through there?

bedtime crackpot theory: what if nayna did it, dressed up like dhurke so that inga (and divination seance viewers) would think it was him? in any case, I love that nayna is becoming a plot point here, she's fantastic.

Also, there have been so many callbacks and recycled ideas from 3-5 at different parts of this game that it never occured to me until now that dhurke is basically godot. If he ends up having committed murder to save maya and then dies on us, that might be a little ridiculous.

Anyway, will take on the trial tomorrow and/or thursday and report back!
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LeonhartFour posted...

Well, we've known Apollo was an orphan (or supposedly since his mother isn't actually dead) since AJ, so he kinda had a "tragic past" already. We just didn't know anything about why he wanted to be a lawyer, and SoJ finally filled in the blank.

I guess so! I'm intrigued to see if they elaborate on the Lamiroir connection before the case/game is over (that always felt like a weirdly unexplored plot point to me), especially if this is Apollo's big character climax or even series farewell - I could imagine him staying in Khura'in from here on and future games shifting focus to Athena or something.

(no spoilers please obviously)

also yes, count me in for team Iris! I also hope that Phoenix continues adopting random orphans, I wanna see Armie Buff hanging around the Anything Agency in AA7
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that's a fair point actually; as harrowing as this case has been, it seems almost like a retcon to be discovering Apollo's inner turmoil and tragic upbringing now. it's just a funny by-product that Phoenix's relatively normal life makes him an increasingly outlying presence in his own cast.

interesting to bring up his seven year slump too, I know that's not the most popular narrative in the series (for good reason) and it's kinda brushed under the rug now plot-wise but I always thought it lended depth to his character, and in a fairly non-outlandish way in comparison to everyone else's considerably more melodramatic hardships.
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so you guys might remember me playing through AA6 earlier this year? I stopped after 6-4 for some reason, but inspired by a surprising conversation about AA with work colleagues this week, I started 6-5 a few days ago!

finished with the Khura'in investigation day now, just the Dhurke trial left (presumably). damn this case has become bleak as hell, I'd need to go back and play some of the other epics to see if any of them feel as tragic and sorrowful as this one (maybe 5-5 might). even the Armie Buff narrative in the prelude was heartbreaking! I started with the day 2 investigation this evening in a fairly melancholic mood, and if anything I think I feel even worse now. super gripping stuff though.

current thoughts, so I can laugh at my mistakes later:

- the queen has to be the mastermind between both crimes. it would seem fairly absurd for her to be physically murdering people herself (surely she has people for that), but I can't see any other suspect. if there's nothing in the sarcophagus, I wonder if she could enter/exit the tomb through there?
- I think Rayfa might be Dhurke and Amara's daughter and yet another psuedo-hostage for the regime
- I have no real idea what Dhurke might be talking about when he says that the trial might have some uncomfortable truths for Apollo. maybe he did kill Inga? Maya said he saved her, after all.
- seems like Inga has prosopagnosia (that thing that Ace from 999 has) and can't recognise faces. doesn't really seem to have any relevance to the case itself yet, but it'll surely make the Divination Seance fun!
- given what we know about Edgeworth, Apollo and Athena's pasts now, it feels amusing and incongruous how little we know about Phoenix's childhood and family. is there anything at all besides the Butz class trial? I guess it makes him a better avatar, but at this point he almost feels like one of the least fleshed out main characters in the series, which is bizarre. maybe if I returned to the original trilogy I'd feel differently.
- if 6-5 sticks the landing, it's a top three case in the series for sure, no? not even 3-5 felt this massive in scope.
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quality wasn't really there but who cares, that was the most entertaining world cup final in decades. anyone complaining is being ridiculous

croatia played great and were certainly more likeable team, so i'm sad for them, but happy for france after euro 2016 (and deschamps, he's taken a lot of crap but dude's record is now fairly undeniable) and they've almost certainly been the best team at the tournament overall

great tournament, great final, deserving winners, it's 2am here so i'm going to bed!
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(not too important, but it's Alf-Inge Haaland whose career Keane ended, not Bredt Hangeland)
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also guys have you seen the last two world cup finals? every match-up is a "potential borefest"

even brazil - argentina would be a tight 1-0 game if it had been the final, that's just what these matches are like. at least these two sides are both technically strong and creative.
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good match, from a semi-neutral perspective it was super tense but enjoyable and fair. Croatia deserved to win overall and them being in the final is an amazing story, but I feel bad for England - this is the first time I've ever found them an endearing team, even if I slightly begrudged their set play-reliant style. who knows what happens now, but I think with that squad and Southgate in charge you guys have a good chance of building something strong for the future - building a real winning mentality is tough, but I wouldn't be surprised to see you in another semi four years from now.

apparently I'm the only one, but I'm really looking forward to the final - I think it's a super intriguing game tactically, and I'd be happy with either team winning. the world cup will be won either the best team in the tournament, or arguably the biggest shock winner ever. and I think either of those would be pretty great. I think it's a tough matchup for Croatia, but i hope i'm proven wrong and it's an awesome match!

P. S. HC I realise you're upset but you guys had a great tournament and you should be proud. and please calm down with the taylor swift "haters" schtick, as a scot you're seeming just a touch "literally obsessed"
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haha XIII you've chilled out over the years but you still take things so personally sometimes (Portugal, Nadal, etc)

if France wins the world cup it'll almost certainly be at least partially because of Deschamps - football results are not some kind of divine karmic justice that reward the worthy, he'll have made it happen.

also even in the Euros France had what, one bad game? I know it was a historic disappointment and you didn't like the result, but still. I don't even think Deschamps is a great coach but some of your word choice is amusingly baffling
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(p.s. borderline facetious here but one could argue england half-throwing the belgium match and ending up with this draw is a tiny bit analogous to portugal's group stage fortune ! )
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I appreciate it's a bit of a stretch (especially when your eventual success is still hypothetical) but it's not what you've done, so much as the manner in which you did it

you've only scored two goals from open play in four matches, and both were against panama

if you guys start turning it on from here and tank Sweden, Croatia and Brazil I'll be happy to reassess!
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XIII_rocks posted...

Can I just say how much I love Kane's goals at this tournament

3 Penalties
2 3-yard rebounds from corners
1 he had no idea whatsoever about

BEST IN THE WORLD

this sums it up for me, I'm beginning to get a real fear that england are going to portugal their way into the final here and maybe even win it

like, sweden are equally uninspiring, but at least that would constitute a genuine surprise like 2004 greece or something. england winning it playing like this would feel like euro 2016 all over again.
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this england performance has been so bizarre, somehow you're 4-0 up and still not looking that good.

that said if you can be this clinical against belgium you might accidentally beat them and land in the half of the draw with all the favourites!
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Shaduln posted...

Ska is amazing. It's basically modern jazz

Corrik posted...

Nobody really considers r and b an actual genre anymore.

is there some kind of secret competition for bafflingly ignorant music opinions taking place here

lurking this topic is a bad idea at the best of times, but dearie me
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Lasa, it's totally valid to dislike rap beef, but I think you have this backwards.

All of the canonized / most notable diss tracks of all time (Takeover, Ether, Hit 'Em Up, No Vaseline, Real MF G'z, etc etc), all of which are at least 15 years old and the last two of which date from your early 90s period, are totally brutal in their insults. Nobody ever uses Q-Tip/Hammer - which was barely even a real beef - as a reference point for how things used to be, which makes total sense when, as discussed, the most high-profile rap beef in history ended with both assailants literally dead.

If anything, this Pusha track is shocking because it's unusually harsh for a modern diss track, which are typically way more tepid. Just last year Drake basically ended Meek Mill's career by saying he wasn't as successful as his girlfriend.
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I always felt like 5-4 wasn't a "full case" on the basis that it ends without knowing the culprit or understanding the crime, and leads directly into another case in which you learn that.

There are other cases involving two separate trials - 3-2, 6-3 - and no-one considers them as two cases. Unless you're defining things as "all cases are created equal, and if the game says it's a case, it's a case", then 5-4/5-5 being one long case is a very arguable perspective.
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thanks for the spoiler tagging, guys! I'll stay careful around this topic while I play through 6-5, but I appreciate the thought.

glad to see some 6-4 appreciation as well, and add me to the Datz fanclub too. dude is excellent.
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yeah, that was broadly how I felt. I think either framing the story as Athena's first solo case or a bona fide Athena-Simon team-up could have been good, but Simon did way too much of the actual legwork here; his role should have been halved or something.

and I agree that it seemed like the "Athena has grown up now" motif from 5-5 was reset here, only for them to get there again by the end of the case. kinda like Edgeworth in 1-5, actually. if Athena is going to be at the centre of things going forward, maybe they can just fudge the details a bit. that's what filler cases are for, I guess!
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also, playing as Athena in 6-4 made me think: if AA4-6 is a loose Apollo trilogy, does that mean AA7 will start an Athena series? I'd be up for that, I think - she's probably a better sidekick than protagonist, but I enjoy her presence a lot.
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on a related note, I just finished 6-4!

you guys weren't wrong, this was a weird ass case. unless Uendo and his persona parade are about to take a flight to Khura'in, this case seemed entirely irrelevant to the rest of the game, which felt super odd, especially for a case this late in the game. I guess the obvious comparisons are 2-3 or 4-3, but even those (flawed cases both) felt more substantial. this genuinely felt like a DLC case, and treated like that it was actually pretty enjoyable. once I got over the everything is so Japanese vibe, it actually worked fairly well - the ending soba/udon twist was the only thing that really felt poorly adapted. I actually quite liked the cast too; Uendo in particular was pretty great (minority opinion maybe?) and absolutely the core of the case in an almost Atmey-esque way. The reveal of the actual killer felt pretty low-key after he left the stand. It was also fun to play as Athena, though this did ring as a totally shoehorned way to get her to do something, and I don't remember her feeling this unsure of herself in 5-3. Blackquill was also pretty great as a sidekick, and I genuinely enjoyed seeing him again, which was a pleasant surprise as I remembered him as good-but-not-great in DD. Sadhmahdi is still a pretty good prosecutor and a fairly dull character, but that didn't affect much here.

So yeah, a good case. Completely baffling in the context of the full game, and certainly one of the weaker non-tutorial cases in the series, but a good case nonetheless. If this and 6-2 are the reason that some people are down on AA6, I think I'll have a very positive opinion of this game indeed!

updated approximate case ranking:

perfect: 3-5 > 2-4 > 1-4
great: 1-5 > 3-4 > 5-4/5 > 3-3 > 6-3 > 3-2 > 4-4 > 5-3 > 1-3 > 5-6
good: 6-2 > 2-2 > 4-1 > 5-2 > 6-4
mediocre: 3-1 > 2-3 > 4-2 > 1-2 > 6-1 > 5-1 > 2-1 > 1-1 > 4-3

6-5, huh? let's do this.
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hahaha awesome. there's something fun about even the obnoxious defendants.

and oh, okay! is it longer than E1-4, for example? i'd consider that a "short story" kind of case too.
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i've heard it referred to as fairly throwaway so i'm not going in expecting the world. but that makes sense to me somehow. if you ignore DLC and consider 5-4 and 5-5 to be essentially one case arbitrarily split in two (as I do), they've never really made a mainline AA game with four full cases.

they've pulled off that balance well in the past (3-4, E1-4), but I'll try to go into this without expectation. all I really ask is that we finally defend a non-assistant character. do these guys do that anymore?
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so, long-delated AA6 update! I finally finished 6-3.

initial thoughts: wow, what a sad case that turned out to be. other than 3-4, is there a more tragic case in the series? I guess any others with genuinely accidental murders are also up there, but this one felt particularly sad. the case also felt particularly desperate, which kind of worked both for and against it. I was only genuinely stuck once or twice, and things definitely came together towards the end, but there were lots of trial sections here where I genuinely had no idea what I was working towards and was just trying to survive. that may have been an intentional representation of the biased and alien Khura'in system, but I felt similarly in 6-2 and that had no such excuse. I don't remember feeling quite so lost in earlier games, which might be a measure of their increasing complexity or simply my fading gaming skills.

outside of that, though, this had a really strong cast of characters, a cool setting, strong narrative, interesting twists, and a powerhouse ending. the suicidal cover-up was a bit absurd, but it certainly framed the case in a very powerful light. there can't be too many better mid-game cases than this one. game's certainly shaping up strong so far!

updated approximate case ranking:

perfect: 3-5 > 2-4 > 1-4
great: 1-5 > 3-4 > 5-4/5 > 3-3 > 6-3 > 3-2 > 4-4 > 5-3 > 1-3
good: 6-2 > 2-2 > 4-1 > 5-2
mediocre: 3-1 > 2-3 > 4-2 > 1-2 > 6-1 > 5-1 > 2-1 > 1-1 > 4-3
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TheRock1525 posted...

And women in general like my penis more than yours.

i assume you're only talking about american women here? i can buy this being true in the US, which is the only the only western country where circumcision is still the norm (and also demonizes foreskin as "weird" for some reason), but any european or east asian woman that exhibited such preferences would be setting herself up for pretty profound disappointment, considering almost no one is circumcised in most of the developed world.
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TheRock1525 posted...

This is literally not true and in fact has been proven in study after study that there's no difference.

there's a reason i mentioned that at the end in a jokey tone - it was hardly the main crux of my argument - but fair enough. a simple google search yields studies that say the opposite too, but i'm happily to admit it seems broadly inconclusive.

but still, surely the burden of proof should be on the people performing non-consensual surgery on babies? if the best argument you guys have is "if you ignore basic hygiene, it can lead to health problems" then we might as well chop off everyone's toes too.

(p.s. i am familiar with vaginas, which is why i said clits were "analogous" and not the exact same thing. but you guys already understand my broader point there, so i won't bother restating it.)
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sorry I'm so late guys, totally forgot about this! gonna switch up the vibe a bit this week.

Anna von Hausswolff - The Mysterious Vanishing of Electra


enjoy!
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just passing by to say that circumcision is clearly barbaric and it's insane that this conversation is even entertained in 2018

if a western doctor tried to cut off a newborn baby's clitoris (which is completely analogous and also qualifies as "tradition" in certain countries) they would be jailed and rightly so. stop advocating for the mutilation of babies, you weird people.

(p.s. it's really not hard to clean foreskin, and the amount of people who don't have one who insist otherwise is baffling to me. plus circumsized men are scientifically proven to experience dulled sexual pleasure, so have fun with that!)
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