iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

wheeeee my awesome artist sent me the pics she took (she's @michellemtattoo on Instagram, btw)

Zoe posing in front of a black background. her left arm is raised, her hand lifted behind her head. you can see the tattoo trailing up her arm: flowy red, like blood; chaotic, black lines of varying thickness zigzagging; thin, wispy botanicals sprouting out of them.

Zoe posing in front of a black background. this shot is of the front of her torso, her arm raised to reveal the same chaotic black lines slicing a waist out of her figure. there are sections of graywash inverting the color on her waist and ribcage. and from some of the thick, black lines sprout wispy buds, growing around her left breast and up her armpit.

the photographer has censored her tits for Instagram.

a shot of Zoe's arm, taken from the perspective of her hand. you can see the line traveling up her palm and growing into a stem up her arm. it sneaks behind the tattoo of Barkus, finishing in some buds at the tip near the crook of her elbow.

her nipple is censored in this one too, for Instagram.

a side shot of Zoe against a black background. you can more clearly see the reedy branches of the tattoo traveling up her armpit and around her left breast. the illusion of hips that the tattoo gives is clearer from this angle too.

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12. Quantum Break I'm a sucker for time travel, and Remedy puts out fantastic story-driven games. I really appreciate the gameplay mechanics, the (somewhat) branching storyline, and how I really didn't know what was going to happen until the end. Also it beat Tenet to the punch.

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11. Mirror's Edge This was such a gorgeous, bizarre game. The art style was so bright, smooth, and colorful. The maddeningly involved controls eventually nudge you into a flow state. The soundtrack was floaty and driving. Such a pretty game about a dystopian nightmare. About refusing to lose hope.

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10. DOOM (2016) Rip and tear, until it is done. I never really got boomer shooters until I played this game. It hooked me from the first scene. The music started, shit got real, doomguy got angry, and my brain turned off and 'splosions and gore happened until I finished the game.

9. MGS 2 I love a sneak-em-up game, and while the first MGS was iconic, MGS 2 felt tighter, looked great, and completely went off the deep end. Oh and Raiden going cyborg ninja was neat too. This was also the first time I'd seen a woman with pit hair in a game, which was badass.

Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty box art

8. Control A story-rich 3D metroidvania about the paranormal packed with lore, with a protagonist I couldn't get enough of (who is _so_ tgirl-coded), creepy atmosphere, a gorgeous art style, and ugh I need more. I was reading Laundry Files novels while playing this, which made it even better.

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7. Disco Elysium Such a bizarre combination of a point and click adventure game and a ttrpg, layered thick with cynicism and satire, with a strong current of melancholy and loss running through it. I laughed hysterically throughout the game and sobbed more than once. And the art style 🥰

6. Tetris Attack I only started playing this game because blockbuster gave you a free game rental if you rented it. Turns out it's got deep mechanics that mix planning and quick reactions. Apparently the dev team didn't think games would last >10min: that's when the timer stops counting up.

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5. Super Metroid I think I lose my tgirl card if I don't have a metroidvania in my top 5, right? This was the first one I played, but also the eerie atmosphere, the floaty but tight gameplay, the deep mechanics, and the SNES graphics make it special for me. Also: THE BABY

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4. The Curse of Monkey Island I grew up in the 90s on LucasArts adventure games. The Secret of Monkey Island was one of the first games I ever played. I love the entire series, but CMI was gorgeous, sounded amazing (it's how I learned about mp3s), and was a joy to play.

Murray the Demonic Skull floating on some driftwood, shouting, "quake in fear, mortal!"

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3. Rez This gave me ideas about what games could be. You might say, "but Zoe, it's just a rail shooter" and I guess you'd be right, but the way the experience changes as you do better is wild. I wrote a thesis/demo on generative music based on what this could have been. (also trance vibrator lol)

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2. Smash Melee This is one of the deepest fighting games I've ever played. I love the air mechanics and how floaty but fast it feels. I'm not good at it at all (never learned to wavedash 😭), but playing with my friends was always fun, and kept all of us on our toes.

No items, fox only, final destination meme, where it's driving school.

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I forgot how hard it is to put on and take off clothing when half your torso is plastered with saniderm

Zoe standing in front of a mirror in a blue bralette and pajama pants. her fresh tattoo work is visible on her left arm and torso, shiny with saniderm. she's smirking juuuuuuust a little bit.

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My Zoe-Called Life @tribadvisor.gay · 17/10/2024

1. Chrono Trigger I feel like everyone's favorite JRPG is the one they played when they were 10-12, and, well. but Chrono Trigger is amazing: the music, the goofy yet sentimental plot, Akira Toriyama's art, and its infinite replayability come together to make it timeless.

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ok this is a _really_ fun session so far

Zoe's arm, with fresh detail on her tattoo sleeve. it's mostly obscured by plastic wrap, but you can see some of the new fine line work.

Zoe standing awkwardly in a mirror trying to get a picture of the progress on her tattoo sleeve

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I forgot about Hive! Devious Methods is one of the best drum n bass albums I've heard in my life and nobody knows about it! listen to it right now. Hive's breaks are wildly intricate, full of syncopation, variance, and texture. Which also makes his tracks fiendishly difficult to mix into a set 😅

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Molten Beats, by Ram Trilogy, is another one that got me into dnb. three big names in dnb came together to form Ram Trilogy: Andy C (The Executioner!), Ant Miles, and Shimon. (Andy C and Ant Miles were formerly Origin Unknown, another huge name in dnb.)

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ok there's not enough drum n bass on this list even though it's mostly all I listen to. Otto's Way, Stealth (which was on Audiogalaxy as Sour), and Meekon by Fresh n Vegas were what got me into dnb. Fresh and Vegas later joined up with Maldini and dBridge to form the legendary Bad Company UK.

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ok look, I listened to a lot of big beat music in the 90s. decksanddrumsandrockandroll by Propellerheads is a great album with lots of upbeat, often silly energy. you'll recognize Spybreak from the lobby scene in The Matrix.

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while we're talking about 90s artists known for big beat music, Dig Your Own Hole by The Chemical Brothers is fantastic. most folks will recognize Block Rockin' Beats, but Where Do I Begin is my favorite song on the album.

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ok back to the 90s. Fat of the Land was the more popular of their albums that decade, but Experience is my favorite Prodigy album of all time. it's definitely from 1992, when hardcore rave was alive and well, but it's also got an undercurrent of jungle to the whole thing. it's so energetic and good

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we're way out of the 90s now but listen to Foley Room by Amon Tobin, or anything else he's done. his use of found audio and ability to craft bizarre yet driving music is unlike any other artist I've heard. he can do something avant garde one minute and then throw down a drum n bass set the next.

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oh and Lilies by Arovane is also too good to pass up even though it's from 2004. it's ethereal, beautiful, and melancholy.

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ok Rounds is from 2003 but it's too good to pass up. if you can, find a promo version of the album with the original version of Unspoken that used a sample from Winter by Tori Amos.

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Music Has the Right to Children speaks for itself. Boards of Canada's music is also haunting, but in a completely different, hypnotic, alien way. I'd add Geogaddi here too, but that album was 2002 :)

album cover for Music Has the Right to Children, by Boards of Canada

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Entroducing is another of my favorites. something about the space between the loops and the grain to the vinyl makes me really gloomy if I listen to this album too much, but it's so, so good.

album cover for Entroducing, by DJ Shadow