#askthenerdling

(( Low-key wondering if anyone happened to notice this little pattern I've been doing for the last 7 years...

Practically the only tradition I've managed to keep alive, because... this blog's got no updates outside of this yearly post. Basically, with Kisno's lore, I determined his birthday to be on April 2nd.

The reason for that, I'll just say something happened ten years ago to the day, left me in such a dark cloud. It's still pretty personal so I don't really want to elaborate too much, but I do want to finally at least share a part of it.

I still sometimes think back to it and wondered if it was just a very cruel April Fools joke, but technically it all took place in the wee hours of the next early morning. Even though I had class that day and I shouldn't have stayed up, I didn't care because I tried to mend things, to no avail. With the rest of the day feeling super numb.

All because I had this random idea of wanting to start my own Nerdling blog, and it came crashing down from there.

It didn't happen immediately but a couple of months later, after I felt better and separated myself from the scenario as a whole, I thought up of this comfort character, just thoughts that would pop up and then a couple sketches being drawn and a simple outline. That's where Kisno came to be. This... interesting Koopaling who was then written to be Nerdling's old friend, turned co-star of the blog. Writing and drawing about Kisno really helped me move past what happened. I was writing A LOT of stories with this Koop... and I hope those stories aren't lost to time, I need to dive deep into my hard drive.

But when it came back to that particular day, I wanted to focus on replacing it with something a little more positive. Instead of, "Oh, it's the day where this happened." I could now say "Oh my gosh, it's Kisno's birthday!"

Thought I'd write a little story time since it has already been that long, and I hardly think about it anymore. Heck, compared to how I was before when recalling it gave me chills and butterflies in my stomach; now when I think back, all I can really think about is Kisno's birthday and my head no longer brings me back to that night, so... it worked!

Any who, what did Kisno get for his birthday this year? Aside from oodles of goodies from today's Nintendo Switch 2 Direct, how about a WHOLE FREAKING NEW CHARACTER?!

Well, okay, they're not a Koopaling. They won't be joining the blog. They're not even related to Mario! But they are a character that's not specifically tied to any kind of IP... They're actually a character that I wanted to represent myself a bit more personally. I think you know where I'm going with this so I'll stop there. :')

Thing is, they're still unfinished. STILL, unfinished. I thought up of them almost two and a half years ago, and I'm still wishy-washy about it. Character creation is already hard, but... creating a character for ME?! Goddess of Hylia, help me...

So, they're in the hazy, "?" Super Smash Bros. mystery character silhouette for now. I may drop a couple hints on some of my socials but... that remains to be seen.

((Another year goes by, another revisit for this curious Koop. With Super Mario Wonder coming out back in October, a game I still haven't finished. :') I wanted to let Kisno have a little fun with that new power-up! I could've given him the Elephant Fruit but... they weren't in season yet...

Tbh, I didn't expect to keep this blog going, just by coming back every year to post about Kisno's birthday. The Koopaling hype mellowed out very long ago... But I still love these two. I still draw Nerdling every now and then. Kisno's a bit of a rarity, but I still like to update him when I can.

I know by this point 10 years ago, Kisno was already somewhat conceptualized. And he didn't make his debut onto the blog until a little bit later, and his arrival was still a bit unexplained! I had a whole idea about that but it never really got fleshed out, sadly. Not just this blog, but several others!