omg tenku for an oc story ask asldkjg
so the obvious for those that don't know is the story was inspired by the music video for DAM by SB19 bc it's a cinematic masterpiece

as for other inspo.. the little bits of politics are inspired a bit by the reforged series by seth haddon, just very very loosely bc seth does a much better job than me with politics lmao

vael'nox is v much inspired by both nald'thal from ffxiv and "nox" is v similar to chaos from hades (supergiant games)

there's a little peppering of lord of the rings, dune, dragon age, world of warcraft, final fantasy xiv, fable, guild wars, and game of thrones inspo sprinkled in there (tho i've never seen game of thrones funny enough)

vael's abilities (that i haven't touched much on yet) are inspired by an oooold guild wars 2 oc of mine, aurelie, who is a mesmer. i really like the idea of illusory magic so i really want to play with that with vael'nox so you'll probably see a lot of similar abilities to gw2 mesmers lol

some of vael's personality is also inspired by zavrius and oren radek from seth's reforged series as well. zavrius is so fucking sassy and true to himself while still being a great king and radek has this sardonic kind of wit, i love them both sm (even if i didn't trust radek at ALL in the 1st book)

damihan's kingdom is inspired v much by the storm coast in dragon age inquisition while vael'nox is more similar to garret?? i think his name is?? from fable 2, his funky mage tower.

delan's return to the living world takes after aragorn's whole falling off the cliff bc of the warg debacle, i feel like that's p obvious once i point it out lol

vael and dam are def the two most fleshed out and i'm sure the others will come with time. i kind of want to incorporate something similar to what happens to king cailan in dragon age origins, perhaps without the permadeath and crucifixion.

i think that's about it? there's still so much work to be done fleshing this all out but i love them all so so dearly and i'm so in love with how everything is turning out thus far.

LMAO OTHER THAN NIER FR
i'll just say other than the whole drakenier franchise lol

final fantasy xv. the story hit me like a ton of bricks and i fell so deeply in love with the characters and the world. the story is so fucking beautiful, the epitome of platonic love and loyalty and also a villain that never wanted to be a villain.

and then the side stories!! "i shouldn't have to buy dlc to get the whole story." shut the fuck up you probably buy horse armor. ffxv is told from a noctis pov you absolute imbecile and the other dlc allow a completely optional look into the other povs - book series do this all the time.

anyway and then the plethora of other side story dlcs got canceled (thank fucking god we even got episode ardyn) and instead of just saying that sucks oh well, THE TEAM TURNED IT INTO A BEAUTIFUL NOVEL. my husband called me on the way from work one day and heard me absolutely fucking sobbing bc i was at the end of the book when he called. the ending was absolute perfection and gamers really robbed themselves of getting to experience that (bc we know gamers can't read.)

also it was the game that got me to affiliate on twitch as well as the entire reason i got on ao3. i'd never used it until i got curious and looked for fanfic (and funny enough never attempted to write fanfic for it.)