This might be a thing

So I've been rather consistently popping back into Fimfic lately purely cause there have been some fics that I want to read here that are still updated. I've also been playing Jojo: Heritage for the Future, so I've been looking at Jojo's Bizarre Adventure crossover fics since that's been on my mind. Just about all the ones I've found that are semi-recent or are still getting updates are bluntly put, shit. I could write my own to try and put out a story I want to see instead of wait for someone to waddle along and eventually do it...I could yet I likely won't. So knowing me I'll instead do a bit to try and point out why these put such a bad taste in my mouth when I initially read them while also advising as to how to make it better.

First, the main thing they always try to do is mention a bunch of cast members that'll have no impact on the story and rush through what events they went through to get people who didn't see the show to care. The main issue of this is that they're trying to get a character that means nothing to have some significance for the 10 seconds that they're there. Another issue is that not only do they rush it they sometimes just get the information wrong or throw some random "fact" that's related to the series but isn't actually connected to the event they're trying to explain in the slightest. Now one small issue is the fact that there's never a good reason why the crossover occurs. Displaced can be entertaining without much of a good reason for it so I don't hold this complaint with as much weight as the others. Now onto the final reason why they leave such a bad taste in my mouth, the most important one, it's how they fail to understand the characters they're putting into the fic.

Now to elaborate on how to fix, or better avoid these things, at least when it comes to poor characterization. Here's a common character people tend to muck up for one reason or another, Dio. Dio's character is an interesting one, he's highly egotistical and selfish and employs tactics to put people beneath him, he's always vying for supremacy. However, one of his basic flaws is that he doesn't analyze people, he doesn't try to learn how people think outside of his cookie-cutter perception of them, and believes all people act the same when tilted. That's why he does everything he can to piss of Jotaro in his final fight because Dio thought it would make him emotional and irrational when that's not how Jotaro actually acts when he becomes angry. Another aspect of Dio is that he's very much a philosopher, he's incredibly book smart and constantly tries to learn new things that would make him in his own eyes even greater than before. That's why he took to chess because it was a game that perceived to be highly intelligent. Now while I can keep going I do want to mention one last detail of his that I see mucked up every single time he is written. He believes he will win a fight before it even begins so during a fight all he's trying to do is entertain himself. Dio does not see a life or death scenario, all he sees is a carnival. The only time he is scared or nervous in a fight is if his ego is being challenged. When this happens he begins experimenting and starts to take things seriously, however, he's still not trying to win he just trying to understand what happened to shake him so he can rationalize it back to his superiority.

Now that I got that off my chest I also want to just bring up that it's a damn shame Heritage for the Future never got a sequel. That game has some of the best system mechanics I've ever seen but some of the characters in the roster are so poorly designed, for example, Petshop and Mariah. Petshop literally breaks the game and I don't need to explain why, look up one 10 second video and you'll see, Mariah is a bit more complicated. She is a mix of a zoner and set-play character with a level-up mechanic. Gameplay wise I really like her base concept since she can plant traps with a single button and if they hit the opponent she levels up. The problem with her is that she's too slow, all of her specials are slow, do little damage, and unsafe. This wouldn't be as bad if Hol Horse wasn't a character that can do everything she does but faster and better. Hol Horse even has an interesting gimmick to just make the comparison worse since he can plan the path of his projectile before it shoots. So some bullets can zig-zag into the air or do a fake-out to shoot behind him if you can somehow get behind him. Because the bullet can be pathed some bullets come out fast while others are delayed due to extra pathing the player put in. I really do respect the design put into Hol Horse. That was definitely a tangent from Mariah but her design is so disappointing it's hard to talk about. To be fair the game was made like 24 years ago so fighting games back then could be very hit or miss due to not perfecting the formula yet. I just wish the game had gotten a second chance.