It's time for the end-of-year fic meme! As is tradition, I'm doing this right at the start of December, because I'm impatient. Last year I ended up posting two more fics after doing the 'end-of-year' wrapup. I evidently learnt nothing from this.

I've written a lot of little ficlets throughout the year, e.g. for promptfests, but for the purposes of this meme I'm only counting fics I've posted to my main AO3 account, or I'm going to get overwhelmed by indecision.


Number of fics written in 2025: thirty. You can find them on my AO3 account: Riona.

Fandoms: Danganronpa, Danganronpa 2, Danganronpa: Despair Time, Project: Eden's Garden, Final Fantasy XVI, The Coffin of Andy and Leyley, Severance, The Hundred Line, Horizon Zero Dawn, Deltarune, Star Trek DS9, Kingdom Hearts, Metaphor: ReFantazio, House MD. Ten videogame fandoms, three television fandoms, one web series. Mainly things I've written for before; only four of these are new additions.

One crossover: Kindred Spirits (The Hundred Line/Horizon Zero Dawn), in which Yugamu and Nil bond over their shared passion for murder.


( End-of-year fic meme, 2025. )


Here's to the next year of writing! And... possibly also the next month of writing, because this is by no means the actual end of the year.

I just tried to post this, and the Dreamwidth post editor told me 'you can't post this, it's got an unclosed italics tag'. Which is a useful feature! Unfortunately, Dreamwidth did not specify where the tag in question was, and there are ninety-four italics tags in this post, so I had a real adventure tracking it down.

More of the Silent Hill 2 remake! I'm still working my way through Brookhaven Hospital.

James, you cannot keep jumping down or climbing into or sticking your hand in or fucking every hole you come across! It's such a bad habit!

You also probably shouldn't keep injecting yourself with every syringe you find lying around Silent Hill. I'll be honest: I think these are unlikely to be sterile.

I yelped aloud when Pyramid Head said hello on the roof. I wonder if they changed that particular encounter specifically so it could still startle people who'd played the original game.

Actually, it might be a camera angle thing. In the original Silent Hill 2, hearing the door to the roof open just out of shot and not knowing what's coming is absolutely terrifying, but that's something you can only do with a fixed camera angle. In the remake, with its freely movable camera, you could swing the camera over to the door as soon as you heard it open, which immediately strips away that 'oh, God, I know something's here with me but I can't see what it is' terror.

I hadn't really contemplated it before, but going from the restricted camera of the original to the free camera of the remake is a pretty huge change in a horror game. What you can and can't see makes such a big difference to the atmosphere in horror, and it's a lot harder to limit what the player can see if they have full control of the camera.

I'd be interested to know all the ways the remake team tried to address this issue. It might be the reason some monsters, mannequins in particular, will run away from the player when spotted and hide in a different room. You've seen the monster, you know it's here, but it's removed itself from your sight; all you know is that it's somewhere nearby, waiting to attack. It's a way to create that sense of 'there's something here, but I can't see it' even when the player can quickly scan their immediate surroundings. (Of course, the radio is also good for creating that sense in both the original and the remake.)


The YouTube music algorithm recently served me a song that I might have heard in passing at some point, but had never really listened to before. Listening to the lyrics, I found myself thinking, Wow, this song is absolutely perfect for James and Mary.

Had it been any other song, the logical next step would be to contemplate naming a fic after it. Unfortunately, the song in question was 'My Immortal' by Evanescence.

It is time for me to be disproportionately bothered by a single detail in a videogame! Today, we're watching me get frustrated over the story implications of the Silent Hill 2 remake's Wood Side Apartments coin puzzle.

There are major spoilers for the entire story of Silent Hill 2 below the cut.


( Silent Hill 2 remake: the narrative problem with the coin puzzle. )


Please acknowledge receipt of my suggestion, Bloober Team. I look forward to seeing it patched in.

I'm still enjoying the remake! But this one detail is sticking in my teeth.