hm~ i don't think there's any specific race actually...
i'm the kind of person who falls into rabbit holes easily, i'm hungry for knowledge, especially when it connects to other things. so uma was a dangerous thing for me to get into... i started by learning about my favorites, then i got interested in the related horses (whether in uma or not). it's not difficult because keiba has many interesting stories and anecdotes. slowly you start to form fuller and fuller images of what was happening, the pedigrees, the people behind the horses, all that. though i do think starting to follow current day happenings is its own hurdle that i overcame with slightly more difficulty
it's not only that it makes uma more fun to notice all the granular detail they put into it, but keiba itself also has such a rich history, i can't help but want to learn more

i heard, it's SOOO crazy!! i was really hoping it'd lead into them getting proper v6 updates, but... this kind of situation... it's really no good HAHAHA i assume vy1/2 seiyuu probably had an idea of what was going on (gut feeling) but the entire thing with nancy's is 100 layers of ridiculousness. my jaw was on the ground reading "yeah they made me read lines in an exaggerated gaijin accent [even though i can do otherwise]". like WHAT...
i don't know if it's a stigma that english speaking voice talent won't like providing for TTS or what... they could have tried being honest about it. no one was really begging for these products especially not nancy, but the fact that they existed as a novelty is pretty cool to me. you know, since i'm a weirdo who thinks most mascots should get speech synth banks in some form
kinda insane the other two went down as collateral but i hope nancy's voice actress at least got some kind of settlement money or something~~~ 😭
kinda fucked how products can just up and vanish like this

it hasn't, don't worry!
why do i love curren... i think it's a good question...
her design grabbed me even when i used to be a hater, it stood out like crazy. and i like cute and even sometimes burikko type characters, so at the very least, it was natural that i would come to like curren. but beyond that, i was met with a great character. above all else i love her pride, her dignity. she knows what she wants and won't stand down, and will not hesitate to get her hands dirty to get it. but she will not harm others in the process. she's kind to those who ask her for advice and helps them, but also isn't afraid to take pointers in things she is weak in. all this while keeping up appearances... she doesn't like to show that she's in trouble, and hides that, since she's a perfectionist...
yup, a bonafide girlboss.
i have big trauma from my idoltwt days about people hating cute characters and dismissing them (circa like 2015) but this kind of thing is not as widespread anymore, but curren falls victim to not only this but the fact that many will reduce her to her negatives because they can't handle her as a character.
either way, i think it's amazing they made a burikko that isn't a caricature. she lives to be cute because she wants to be cute. i love that self conviction. it makes sense why even though she's not an ikeonna type, she's still relatively popular with female uma fans. fellow oneechans of the world, te amo🩷

no problem! it's a really important thing for ⚡️, both for her as a character since it's a traumatic experience and for her potential relationship with ✈️. the real life ⚡️, as far as i know, did not have any famous episodes about his mother. i think their lack of connection as parent and child is partly based on the famous anecdote of stablehands drawing lots because they didn't want to deal with his temper + the take yutaka quote about him wanting to see wtf ⚡️ was thinking (these two facts influence a large part of ⚡️, but you know what i mean). on the other hand ✈️ is ALL ABOUT the maternal bloodline, it's always "[the legacy of] the mother and the grandma" with him (such romantic sentiments were quickly replaced by increasingly harsh comparisons to ⚡️ and later 🧪 after the derby). what i'm saying is, basically, i think ⚡️'s relationship with her mother is cyge playing the long con and setting up a parallel between ✈️, who will definitely be obsessed with her mother in the opposite way.
because, you know? ⚡️'s relationship with her mother is viscerally bad. ⚡️ is written to be an autistic character. it's not coding, she is straight up very intentionally written to be autistic. so you can imagine just when i say this the potential issues she would have come across as a child. her mother was well meaning, but basically it all boiled down to, "i don't want you to suffer, please act like a normal kid". when ⚡️ was scolded by adults or had trouble with other kids, her mother had already given up by then, saying things like "she's always like that, just leave her to her own devices". in private it's her not knowing how to help her child, her new support card there's a conversation where she's basically begging ⚡️ to take the path of less resistance and try to be normal. i don't think her mom is a bad person, but she was not able to be a good parent in this circumstance. we find out in 🦋 (the niece) ikusei that she's a famous singer, and that ⚡️ would be attending her performances at establishments with difficult looking books, later her laptop. so it seems like not only was unable to figure out how to raise a child like ⚡️, she was probably also preoccupied a lot even though it really seemed like she loved ⚡️ and was trying her best. (i don't have 🦋, so this is based on what i've heard).
to me, an important thing is that ✈️, who doesn't understand ⚡️ whatsoever, is likely to do and say things that scratch open wounds like that. that's right. "✈️ is a presence similar to ⚡️'s mother". not only because she has a good relationship with her mother and would probably bring it up a lot, but in a more visceral sense... she probably moves the same. i don't know how to articulate it, but part of ⚡️'s trauma is that her mother and other adults never once tried to understand her, only tried to make her do and act a certain way. so ✈️ is not dissimilar. to me, ✈️ is also autistic, but in a way that's completely incompatible with ⚡️. she stuck to her mother like gum, using everything to do with that as a strict guideline. she follows the rules to the letter, too. she's very appearance obsessed, so she's constantly masking even when it's exhausting. since 🧪 does whatever she wants and still gets results, ✈️ put pressure on herself to stand out from her as a good kid. but even if she works hard, it's very thankless. it's a compounded spiral of obsession. she's got good manners so she is good with most social situations on the surface, but she's actually not very sensitive and can't read people at all. it's that kind of thing. ⚡️ has no interest in putting up a front for others on the other hand... that's the difference between them. ⚡️ won't please others because they rejected who she was and tried to change her, when all she wanted was to be understood. everything about ✈️ is a reaction to wanting to be what is most suitable for others... namely as someone who will succeed her family's racing legacy (really, a lot of it is in direct reaction to 🧪 and not wanting to be compared to her)
so she will keep trying to connect with ⚡️ without realizing her approach is entirely offputting. she also has a very specific image of ⚡️ in her head and gets riled up when it's not the way she thought. and parcae ends up being her natural enemy... i don't think it's far off to think that ✈️ may one day end up repeating something ⚡️'s mother said and things go downhill. in general having a mental script of all the "good" and "socially acceptable" things to say to others not only doesn't work on ⚡️ but will also piss her off. i said it before, but the ✈️ who hates 🧪 for being weird (even though ✈️ is also very weird just in a different way), if she grew up with ⚡️, she would probably not like her at all. but ✈️ and ⚡️ met now and became rivals, so she became obsessed with her instead. she doesn't get the hint. she only thinks "maybe i approached her at the wrong time or said the wrong thing. i'll try again later". she feels a connection to her and wants it realized so desperately, so she keeps trying. ⚡️ wants nothing to do with her tho.
✈️ is weird as hell though, if ⚡️ told her she hates her (as a final resort), she would probably be happy. ⚡️ actually thinks about her... 🥲 (i hope ⚡️ does something like this. at kawachi jockey's retirement ceremony, which was also the race where he rode ✈️ instead of other objectively better choices, take jockey said he came to hate him for foiling his three derby win streak. ofc it's said in jest but, i think it'd be a waste if this anecdote was not used)

about ✈️... hm...
it started when i read shatan's character story. the 7 cm thing kind of just catches you... but the ✈️ from that day was soooo different, i pictured a happy go lucky protagonist type, but the current ✈️ isn't very protagonist-like at all, it’s like the ship of theseus at this point. if you see the original ✈️ design draft, the design is similar on the surface, but also completely unrecognizable at the same time. so imagine how it is aside from design… it’s completely different now. so right, i made a design but then forgot about it for a few months. until the end of last september, i was on a trip and ended up doodling her on a hotel paper, so i was like "right, i made something like that". i went back to actually research without thinking much of it, not realizing i'd fallen into the hole.
you know? there's a lot of interesting things about ✈️. it's not just his literal pedigree that puts pressure on him from the family angle. his trainer's (who trained 🌼, him and 🧪) father trained his grandmother. his jockey rode grandmother -> mother -> both sons. his owner used horseracing as a family activity and had heavy personal investment in the grandmother’s bloodline… it’s a lot, it’s a very dramatic story even before ⚡️ ever enters, or hell before ✈️ is even born.
and the 7 cm itself!! the misfortune of the 00 generation!! they didn’t really have a happy ending at all as racehorses, but i’m glad irl ✈️ got to live a long life when most of his family were not able to 🥲
my favorite thing about ✈️ is that he’s so cute🩷 (cullen top 10 kimoi otaku moments)
seriously, if you look at my locked account (which anyone can enter) half the tweets are me taking screenshots of old recordings of paddock vids and old races like very cute🩷 kawaii🩷 so polite🩷 ✈️kun got praised so much, erai🩷 (no it’s seriously kimoi) (he’s like an idol to me)
i know my feelings are extreme, but if my design can incite even 1% of that feeling in people, then i feel like i did something right. i hope it’s like that for you guys too because i want to convey his charms succinctly... <-guy who wrote 20 essays in one month

first, thank you for your well wishes! i'll be doing my best 🙇‍♀️
hm~ thoughts on the new scenario~
really crazy lineup for the scenario link characters. the other triple crown/tiaras are definitely link as well, but who knows about other gaisenmonshou characters (l'arc double dip..?? i want tap vocal on the new song pleek) or even perhaps who matches umadol definition...
i'm very curious about the niche of the scenario. i hope that it's a very generalized raising thing, but also that it's as light as mecha was. but i also want a lot of new animations for photo studio~~ (vivlos voice) onegai~~~~
as for the new characters... it's a scenario released on the anniversary. it's natural for me to expect that the three umamusume they're calling legends will be showing up as themselves, not as mobs. the speed symboli namedrop makes me confident...
also, if we get speed symboli, it means i'll stop hearing "stay gold won't become playable because she already graduated". i'm not saying speed symboli is becoming playable!! idt she will be, it's my belief that some horses are just too old and adding them would be a detriment to them as characters.. (as they would have very few relations the cast)
in general, isn't it huge? the idea that we can get such legendary japanese racehorses in uma without the restriction of thinking of how to make them playable? i know many will complain about them not being playable, but personally, i like when characters are properly developed and feel justified. st. lite, speed symboli and haiseiko are best suited to be seniors who have already accomplished their feats. it'd be nice to see more of that if it fits...
yeah, i really don't think it's TTG. i'm kinda wishy washy about wanting ten point, his fate irl was horrible, but cygames would never do it disrespectfully.. still, remembering it makes my stomach churn. i think we will get TTG one day, the three of them together. they can even be playable maybe!
just wait for soccer boy to become playable... that ten point namedrop will come and we will all be gagged just like how gagged we were at the stay gold mention
yeah, i think TTG is about the oldest uma will get with playables if they go for it, but even then it feels like a bit of a challenge 🤔 the three of them have to be introduced together or else their scenarios wouldn't work (sudden tangent over)
I WANT THE NEW MV TO COME OUT~~~ 😭😭😭 i wish it was anni song so it can have hella vocals out the ass. anni song has tough competition already. cygames, please don't set yourself up like this if you can't deliver HAHAHAHA

of course... it's natural for a princess (real) and a prince (vibe) to get along... 😌
to call back on denkasama's own relationships, for example her and shatan, they share a special and unbreakable bond because fine doesn’t care what others say or think about shatan, and in turn shatan is frank with her without paying much mind to her being the princess of another country. no kiddie gloves for the most part. i think this part of fine is very important. shatan doesn’t care about what others think and proceeds with her life and her way of thinking, even when others try to “fix” her. the trainer has to come to understand this quickly so their relationship as trainer and trainee can work. somehow fine completely disregards this in a way that can actually reach shatan, probably due to her own boldness. she doesn’t stand down and chooses to pierce through all shatan’s defenses no matter how much pushback she gets.
now flight and fine’s relationship is way less intense than this lolol... i think it’s tap’s role for flight. though tap is different from fine, she’s probably going to support flight to a point, like “i can’t save you, i have my own dream” (probably only comes to this if things proceed how they did irl… i wrote a fusetter like that, it was finished but i wasn’t satisfied with it and thought it was cringe.. i might just post it eventually anyway whatever).
shatan carves her own path in spite of society she while not having choice in the matter, flight chooses to remain confined in it. she’s basically a rules obsessed type autistic person as opposed to shatan who exhibits behavior that others her. not only because it’s comfortable but partly in rejection of how tachyon is and wanting to separate herself from her. it’s also like, shatan rejecting her mother’s comfort while flight actively seeking it out to the point of detriment.
fine and tap are both foreigners who crash into things and do things their own way, but tap is much more savvy due to having to ~pull herself up by her bootstraps~ while fine has an air of naivety to her due to her being watched over always. but in the end, despite everything, i don’t think the effect they have is much different, which is why they get along very well. wouldn’t they go as far as to have an alliance to get shatan and flight to get along? (when things have cooled down)
this is a lot of preamble, but i felt like it was necessary… 🤣
of course flight would act utmost proper around fine, not knowing how to balance between “being respectful to royalty” and “treating her like any other girl”. it’s a blessing in disguise because flight is very socially inept underneath her overreliance on manners and other constructs, so fine sees right through it and it doesn’t come off as stifling like it would with people who act like that as a matter of course. it doesn’t take too long before they’re having fun like normal girls, flight ends up lowering her guard down without realizing very quickly.
✈️ would you allow me the pleasure of escorting you today, your highness?
🍀 waaai~
it’s like playing pretend? maybe~? i don’t think flight herself realizes it anyway or how much she sucks at keeping it up. she also doesn’t realize that she feels very safe around fine. there’s very few people like that for her, the kind of person who imposes a million rules on herself and shackles herself to them. they can have fun with no reservations. it’s not like fine thinks flight is stupid, but she doesn’t point anything out and is both amused and happy that flight is comfortable around her. since she always looks so stressed and tired otherwise…