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Erased is a murder mystery and (without spoiling too much) there's a teensy tiny bit of time travel involved.

Your Lie in April is a show about a kid who is a genius piano player but somehow developed a mental block which makes him lose the ability to hear whatever he's playing. He ends up meeting someone who inspires him to play again, despite still struggling with that mental block.
I must say though that this show made me cry, and I happen to like shows that do that, but I understand it might not be for everyone. Clannad is also a great example, but I haven't finished that one yet.

This thread is all about music. Do you wanna discuss your favourite artists? This is the place for that. Do you wanna drop the latest music video of said artists? You can do it here. Do you make music yourself? This is where you can let us hear it and talk about it.

I'll start by linking a song I love.



Which reminds me.... how do I put a preview of a YT video in here? 

From the top of my head, two anime I really enjoyed and would wholeheartedly recommend are Your Lie in April and Erased.

[Welcome to the CTU OOC thread!]

Welcome to the CTU OOC thread!

This first post is mostly meant to provide some initial info about the CTU RP thread. The actual meat of the whole setting is going to be put on the wiki (eventually).

Now... let's tackle a couple of things.

What the heck is CTU?
CTU (Clock Town University) is meant to be both the sequel and spiritual successor to HySchool, a RP thread from a couple of years ago where, among others, Valkyrie and I took a bunch of our RP characters and put them in a high school setting, then threw in some drama, romance and mystery.

So we're gonna move on to the college years and have some new players and new characters and loads of fun.

Where does it take place?
Hyschool had this sort of ambiguity about it where it took place in a setting that pretty much is similar to our world, with references to existing countries, while also taking place in a place called Hyrule (of Legend of Zelda fame). There were barely any fantasy elements, and all characters were just regular ol' human, even if the initial characters they were based on were not.

In short: sorta in the real world, but in a fictional country.

What kind of university is CTU?
The fun is that we can find out together! I've come up with a couple of things already, but feel free to add or make suggestions to change these aspects of the uni.

1) The dorms are coed.
2) The university somehow manages to cover a heck of a lot of degrees and courses. This is so that characters can study very different things while still having opportunities to interact with each other.

Do I need to know anything about Hyschool to participate?
Not really. There will be the occassional reference to HS events, but in essence CTU is self contained. We would be excluding everyone but a handful of people otherwise.
In case something that happened in HS might become relevant to the story of CTU, we could put that on the wiki.

Anyway, that's all I can think of at the moment. Feel free to ask questions, make suggestions, etc. etc. :)

Arélana

The campus of CTU was teeming with life as the first wave of the new batch of students started populating the previously abandoned part of the dorms. It was still more than a week before classes started, but the fresh blood would not want to miss the renowned Week of Welcoming. Getting to know your fellow students, learning about the university’s rich history, exploring campus. All the essentials to help prepare for the ultimate Clock Town University experience.

There were definitely no crazy parties that influenced the WoW’s popularity. At least, that’s the idea that the officials try to sell to the students’ parents. If her sister’s stories were anything to go by, Arélana was to assume otherwise. Not that she would want to spend a week partying her ass off, even with Marelle’s constantly assuring her that she would love it.
Even now, as she is moving into the dorm room she is going to call home for the foreseeable future, Arélana has to make great efforts to tune out her sister’s blabbing about what a great time she was going to have here. Not that she had a lot of opportunity to focus on that. Her brother was a bit too overzealous in not letting her do any kind of lifiting.

“Here Lana, let me take that from your hands too.”

Arélana reluctantly let go of the box she was carrying. She knew Valvius meant well, but she did not like being treated like a fragile doll. Even though she had lost strength and feeling in one of her arms and therefore lifting things wasn’t ever going to be easy for her, she had always been someone who would do as much as she could without help. She decided to let it slide, however. Arélana wanted her first day at her new habitat to be a good one. Just one day without confrontations, without drama. Only a day of space to breathe would be enough to create a tiny, little zen garden in her head and be able to take on the weight of whatever the rest of life had to offer. And thus, she let her big brother do his thing. It probably made him feel better as well.

Arélana looked at the middle aged couple standing in the doorway of her dorm room. She gazed at their faces, trying to find out what they were feeling. The results of her analysis was that she couldn’t tell for sure. From logic and prior experience, she could deduce that it was probably some mix of happy and sad feelings. Some pride, some sadness. Her father’s sharp face was ever the epitome of stoicism, and Nayru knows whatever her mother’s ever-present half-smile indicated.

“Ari,”, her mother started, with a tone that evoked…concern? “Are you still sure about…Well, this.”, she said as she made a circular motion with her arms, pointing towards Arélana’s upper body. She was going to assume that her mother was hinting at the top she was wearing.

“You know I don’t like sleeves.”, she replied, trying to mask the mild agitation she felt.

“Yes, of course, but…”, her mother replied, playing with a strand of her long, blond hair. A sign of nervousness, Arélana knew. “People can see.”

“I don’t think I mind. Someone is going to find out eventually.”
She looked at herself in the mirror. All the features that made her Arélana Athryn where there. Thick wavy dark brown long hair, pale skin, green eyes, no sleeves, and a nasty scar on her left shoulder.

“I’m sure I’ll be reminded of it no matter what.”

---
Randio

First day on campus. Not the first day of classes. Randio was not thrilled. He didn’t even want to show up for the Week of Welcoming. But that bastard of a butler Biron had to convince him to have “some more fun in his life” once again. And Randio listened, because it wasn’t like he really had a choice. Better to agree immediately than have Mr. Blackpool come up with some crazy plan to make him go anyway. In the end, he would have to go if he wanted to make any friends. He had made some progress in that regard in the last year of HySchool high school. Still, they were baby steps, and he had learned that he had a lot of things to process before things would be as they were again. If ever. The most important thing was that he was working on it.

And here he was, sitting in a large expensive car driven by the family butler, ready to take his first baby steps into what would be his life for the next couple of years. He looked to his left, where aforementioned butler was sat, his hands on the wheel, staring ahead, wearing a smile that was the second most regular occupant of his face (the shit eating grin being the first).

“You’re gonna love it, Master Randio.”, he said in the most terrible impression of… some posh British accent.

“I thought you had stopped that.”

“Stopped what, Master Randio?”

“You’re not Alfred Pennyworth, Biron.”
“
What do you mean, Master Bruce?”

“I will friggin’ punch you, Blackpool.”

“Just trying to get one more rise out of you while I still can, Randy. You’re not gonna be sharing a building with little old me anymore. No, no. no. Instead, Master Randio is going to share a building, and much more, with a buncha hot-“

“Please don’t finish that sentence, Bi. I’m here to study.”

“Of course, kiddo.”

As the car neared the parking lot of the campus, Randio started to feel more and more anxious. He could see the people staring at the car. This was one of the moments he wished he wasn’t loaded. Sadly, he didn’t get to pick the car this morning.

“Can’t we park somewhere where there are… you know, fewer people?”

“You wanna haul all your shit over a bigger distance? Be my guest. And you do understand you can’t avoid being seen, do you? And you do realise that wearing those shades aren’t going to make you stand out less, do you?”

“Fine.", Randio sighed. "Let’s get started then.”

I would like to send one more person along with your party, if you don't mind.

Poffertjes, obviously.

Also oven pancakes are a nice combination between waffles and pancakes. Hmm...

But fo' real tho: I prefer waffles. Especially Brusselian ones with whipped cream.

I'm also in the Smash and Soul Calibur camp I've also played a couple of Dragon Ball fighting games, but none that actually count as good fighting games.

Re: getting into these games:
It's gonna take a lot of patience. I dunno, sometimes I can only get juggled into a combo without landing a single hit so many times before I feel like giving up 

But I have fond memories of virtually beating up (and being beaten up by) family and friends :)

Welcome all! I am sure you will enjoy your time here :)

[BOOM!]

Today was a resting day.

That's what she kept thinking as she agitatedly paced through the small . Today would be no hunting. No cutting wood. No helping others lift heavy stuff. No physical activity whatsoever. Just staying home and doing nothing.
It felt like a punishment, even if it was self-imposed. She told herself she needed at least one day in the week to rest, as even her body had its limits. Probably. That's what the villagers told her. She'd usually react by glaring at them, because that would make them leave her alone immediately, but that didn't seem to work on some of them anymore. She knew the villagers had the best intentions with her, so she usually went along with whatever they suggested, but this was just so boring!
And once she got bored, it would get harder and harder to distract herself from thoughts she didn't want to have.

Osin is what her parents named her. "Servant." Might have well named her "Trash", given what they did to her. She could hardly remember their faces anymore, and she wasn't sure if she wanted to. They probably forgot about her as soon as they exchanged her for a bag of gold. As hazy her memory of home was, the journey away from there was still as clear as day in her head. She could remember the smell of sweat, shit and seawater. The misery. Arriving in a land with strange people, who all spoke a language she wouldn't learn how to speak properly for a long time. The fear and uncertainty she had felt, and had sworn to never ever feel again.

The first years were the toughest, but she survived, and it wasn't all misery. The last few years in servitude were almost... pleasant. The people responsible for her kept her well-fed at least. But that all had to end as well. Once she ventured into Kingfisher's Forest, she never looked back.
The villagers of Ceadaichte Mòir took her in, and she has learned to accept them. She repays them by helping them with work, or do some hunting for them.

She picked up one of the books she had borrowed from the teacher lady, Sine. Reading usually led to her getting headaches, but it would at least distract her from bad thoughts. She had only begun learning to read after she arrived in the village two years ago. She never really understood why she picked it up, because everything she's read so far was never that interesting. Perhaps it was because she never had the chance to in her old life. This book in particular was about the Kingfisher's Forest. Osin thought about how it got its name. She's seen the king before, and he didn't look like no fisherman. Maybe it was a play on words she didn't understand because she was foreign. She didn't know. She would ask Sine, but she was afraid she would have to listen to hours and hours of droning about the magical trees. And Osin could use that precious time to chop down said magical trees.

Nevertheless, Osin did think Sine was nice, despite everything. She did take the time to teach her how to read, despite her having the attention span of a mosquito and the patience of... well, her. Sine would lend her books, and Osin would try to read them. Any word she didn't understand, she would try to write down on a piece of parchment. She would then shove the parchment in Sine's face the following day and demand her to explain what the words meant.
As she concentrated on the book, she could feel her agitation diminish. Forest. Trees. Princesses. Whatever. It all made her sleepy.

BOOM!

"What the..."

WHO DARED DISTURB HER SLUMBER!?

Osin sat upright in her chair as the shaking ground and loud noise shook her awake. She quickly stood up and stumbled, disoriented for a moment. Shaking her head, she walked towards her window and peered outside. She could see smoke coming from the area beyond which the forest lied. Some people were outside, but nobody seemed to want to act. Grumbling, Osin went to grab her hatchet, bow and arrow and ventured outside. Soon enough, more and more people would also come out of their houses, but would stop in their tracks as they saw the hulking Elven woman with wild, dark hair walk steadfastly towards the woods, weapons at the ready.

Her piercing, grey eyes soon found a silhouette in the distance. Was it the instigator of the explosion? She had heard the sound before. It was never associated with good things. As she got closer, she recognised the silhouette. It was teacher lady. She kept her bow at the ready, arrow in her right hand. She didn't see Sine for someone who would mess around with gunpowder, but in this world, you never know. Osin decided that she'd try to feel out the situation. She felt she would give the woman a fair warning before she'd pepper her with arrows, anyway.

"Oi! Sine! Don't ye ken yer nae supposed tae play wi' fire?"

This is pretty difficult, to be entirely honest. I wouldn't be able to pick one game per year. Sometimes there were multiple games, or one game that has gripped me for longer than a year. Also, my memory is just plain bad.
Anyway, here goes:

1996-1999: Several edutainment games I don't remember the name of, Putt Putt Saves the Zoo, Jazz Jackrabbit 1 and 2, Lego Island, Soul Blade
2000: Super Mario 64, Banjo Kazooie, Mario Kart 64, Mario Party, Pokémon Stadium
2001-2002: Pokémon Stadium, Pokémon Yellow, Pokémon Gold (definitely the Pokémon period)
2003-2005: Ocarina of Time, Majora's Mask, Fire Emblem: Blazing Blade, Mario Kart: Double Dash, The Minish Cap, A Link to the Past, Super Smash Bros., Super Smash Bros. Melee., Tales of Symphonia
2006-2010: Soul Calibur 2 & 3, Fire Emblem: Sacred Stones, The Wind Waker, Oblivion, Knights of the Old Republic, Twilight Princess, Super Smash Bros. Brawl, Kingdom Hearts 2, The Godfather
2011-2013: Skyrim
2014: Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines, Mass Effect 1-3
2015: Crusader Kings 2
2016: Crusader Kings 2, Mount and Blade: Warband
2017: Crusader Kings 2, Doki Doki Literature Club
2018: Crusader Kings 2
2019: Crusader Kings 2
2153: Crusader Kings 3

The games I have come back to throughout the years were mostly those from the Zelda, Fire Emblem, Elder Scrolls and Pokémon series.

I am Jens, or Randio.

The only thing you need to know is that I love you.

I'm Dutch, but not really, but actually I am. I love anything that brings you into different worlds, whether that's film, literature, games or whatever else. Music's also a major thing. I play guitar, and I sing (horribly).

I'm here because here's good people.
I'll be here to chime in once in a while and maybe provide a listening ear to anyone who might need it. I'll also likely be found in the writing section.

So, eh... yeah! Hi!