A to Z Challenge: The A's of Final Fantasy

Welcome to the A-to-Z Blogging Challenge of 2016!!

This year, I decided to highlight characters from my favorite game franchise, Final Fantasy, so this year, my blog title is tagged with the A-to-Z abbreviation for gaming (GA). I also plan to see what the other gaming bloggers are on about. I can't wait!

So today's letter is A, and at first, I only had one character, and then, I forgot a summon, and then, I remembered someone else, so we have a three for three here.

But ladies first! Here is Final Fantasy's sweetheart: Aeris Gainsborough from Final Fantasy VII.

If you follow my normal blog, you've seen me discuss Aeris's heart-wrenching story already. For everyone else, Aeris was the last living Ancient. The majority of her race was killed or mutated into monsters by a shape-shifting alien that scientists mistook to be an Ancient, and they used it to create super humans and by accident, a bunch of monsters. Smart people, right? (More on that thing later in the alphabet.)

We meet Aeris as a flower girl in the slums and fall immediately head over heels for her sweet spirit and can do attitude. She's basically the most powerful character in the game that we never get to really use. She is brutally murdered early on and still manages to save the world in the end with a prayer and a white materia she thought did nothing.

Arcade Sushi ranked Aeris's death as the 3rd most shocking death in video game history in 2013, and indeed it was.

The mysterious Auron is walking around Final Fantasy X with a great big blob of water following him and destroying things as it goes when we first see him, so we don't know what to expect. A guardian from the real world of Spira (this gets explained a couple of times during this challenge), Auron is actually a good guy and brings together our main character Tidus (coming later) with the rest of the cast to save the world.

He is an awesome swordsman, and spoiler alert: HE'S DEAD!! Killed by the evil summoner Yunalesca when he realizes something is amiss (more info on that later), he holds on so he can help bring her and her psycho father Yu Yevon down.

The aeon Anima in FFX is possibly the scariest aeon you can summon in any Final Fantasy game (and this reveal still gives me chills)! You only see the top half until Anima does her (yes, Anima is a woman!) overdrive attack, and then, you see this thing!

AHHHHH!!!!

Speaking of crazy summons, stick around for Bahamut tomorrow! (I promise most of these posts won't be this long!)

A to Z Challenge: Writing Colors - Azure

Welcome to the 2015 Blogging from A to Z Challenge!

The challenge this year is dedicated to Tina, whom I never got to meet, but she impacted a lot of people in the writing blogosphere, and this was a great idea to honor her. So let's get it done!

This year, I decided to provide different colors for descriptive purposes in writing. I'm using the website Color-ize to look at an alphabetical list of colors that we can use instead of using the same basic colors we know off the top of our heads. One color can come in so many shades, so why not take a look at them? :)

The first few I want to highlight happen to be shades of blue (it used to be my favorite color), so I'm starting A to Z with a series. ;)

Today's color is Azure.

This color is probably one of the first shades I think of when I think of blue. It's probably what most people call bright blue, because it is. It's vibrant and happy, and what we all colored our skies with in Microsoft Paint.

Another shade of blue that begins with A: Aqua (even though it has a lot more green in it).

A is for Andi and Allen

Andi is my sister two years younger than me. Oddly enough, she acts like she's the older one. Or maybe I act like the younger one; I don't know. Anyways, We've been joined at the hip since I can remember walking and talking. She's the Brain to my Pinky, the Beavis to my Butthead, and more popularly, the Ashley to my Mary Kate. Most people do think we're twins, so when they find out we're two years apart AND that I'm the older one, they're pleasantly surprised.

Like me, Andi is a writer, and while I think she's been on hiatus for some time (college really does that to you), she's a great romance writer. I can always relate to her characters, and even when she's delved a little into the surreal with her work (or especially, I guess), I've loved every word she's written. I hope she gets back to it in full force soon!

Allen is my brother from my other mother, my mom's baby sister. Our family is close-knit, and throughout the years, we've all lived together in various time-frames and mixings. Allen is the oldest boy of the 15 grandchildren, and he's two years older than me. Growing up, we played Nintendo, then Sega together, watched wrestling and wrestled together (until the day I bit through my tongue, but I did win a 50-cent piece for breaking out of a full nelson later on in our craziness), and most importantly: he introduced me to Final Fantasy, which has managed to weave itself through my life since about 1999 and helped me create my current fantasy WIP, Save the Queen.

He's a great father and uncle, and he still has my Final Fantasy Crisis Core case, but I love him anyway. :)