#I love talking about twewy

[chilchucks-timbs]

What do you think of the sequel of twewy then? You talk a lot about the original but I'm interested in your opinion of the second part because I saw a few fans disappointed :o

OKAY. Omg.

So first of all? Soundtrack? SLAPS. We won. We won with the sequel soundtrack. I actually prefer some of the new remixes to the original!

The artwork? Stuck to the original style. Can’t complain at all. The new designs? PEAK. They’re so cool. There’s new shopkeepers- who look AWESOME- who have LORE. We can access NPC LORE. I read about one who is married to one of the players? Catch me eating popcorn at that story.

Shout out to the sprites you get when you’re feeding your party members? They’re so cute. In original TWEWY we just had a voice telling us if they liked it after I’ve fed them. NOW we get to know via their face going 🤢 or 🥺 BEFORE they eat so I can give them something they definelty like! and I think that’s fun and funky fresh.

Gameplay? Fantastic. Absolutely brilliant. - the original game had a switch port and honestly? I really think they should’ve done better with the controls. What worked and was beautiful for the ds- felt very clunky on the switch. Especially when playing console? I mean what in the Wii controller buLLSHIT. I need my attacks ACCURATE and on tv that’s very very hard. My friend managed it but? Maybe I just need to get good LSLGFSPALDL. But NEO twewy? beautiful. Perfect. Great for the switch. no complaints on the new battle system.

The story:

edit: THE HUMOUR IS THERE. I FORGOR. I forgot how fucking funny it is. The amount of screenshots I have? Hilarious. Not any like quotable moments like there is in the original game. But there’s so much silly billy shit going on. Bunch of CLOWNS I swear.

Its messaging is not driven home as much as the original twewy is. Like my friend had to explain to me what they were doing because it’s very very subtle. The characters are changing but only just a little. -unlike the first game which, like? At the end of the game? These guys are CLEARLY not the same people who entered the game!! These are Zuko ATLA level transformations!!!: whereas Neo twewy game says? Hey. Your actions are kinda sucky bro. Ever thought about changing up your style? Like it’s THERE. But it’s clearly not the CORE of the game like the first one. And that’s where it falls flat FOR ME. I LOVE and ADORE character development and it’s just not the focus of NEO twewy. But that doesn’t mean I hated the game. I just don’t prefer it over the original.

What NEO twewy DOES focus on is world building which. I think they’ve made some super cool and interesting choices. Even if I, and many Joshua kiryu fans don’t agree with them. 💛 we just straight up ignore the new lore because we don’t like it- the one around Joshua anyway. They bring in some new reapers and some new plot line surrounding shinjuku. That’s fine. That’s fun. But. Joshua? MY MAN? No square enix, you don’t know my blorbo of 10 years better than me :))

So. In conclusion. I was not DISAPPOINTED. I just think they lost the core of what twewy meant to people for the sake of focusing on the new details theyve added. I think rindo and fret and nagi deserved better development.

ALSO IDK HOW I FEEL ABOUT TEAMS? I MISS PARTNERS. LIKE TEAMS IS FINE I GUESS BUT. PARTNER WAS SPECIAL.

Okokok real conclusion is that I was not disappointed. I had fun. I loved a lot about this game. But the original hit home so hard, and the sequel was just a good game.

[kibibarel]

Shoka in her first Reaper's Game:

[gramophoneturtle]

Cat Comcatibility - Chisa

Chisa gets a whole comic for her Cat Comcatibility Check! She unfortunately chose to try and make friends with a cat That Did Not Want Pets. So now begins her arc of declaring war on cats, not helped by her Father seemly siding with those feisty furballs over her!

All in one version below and some more details.

A stunning example of Father's parenting! Keeping it spoiler free for this post, but his current perspective and priority Chisa, life, cats, and so on causes some friction between the two.

While Null understands Father's perspective they have become incredibly protective of Chisa, and at times a little much like this cat interaction here. They didn't need to pull Chisa away so strongly and scare away the cat and they didn't need to try and confront Father about it so strongly.

Chisa knows a cat scratch wouldn’t have been awful, and she knew there was a possibility of it happening in the first place but she was hoped it would be ok somehow. Despite that, she was hoping her Father would have shown at least a hint of proper care towards her. Just a small, even lightly spoken, “You ok? It’ll heal over quickly, see?”

It's something she wants to hear.

[cq-studios]

Wake up. Missing Link was never cancelled. This last month was all just a bad dream.

It wasn't real. It wasn't real. It wasn't real. It wasn't real. It wasn't real. It wasn't-

[bluntforcefem]

thought too hard about putting neku from the 3yr timeskip between twewy & neo on the train and now i'm trying to untangle what the fuck that even Means for him

[taffy-glitch]

For anonymous questions:

1) Are you more of a dog person or a cat person?

2) any favorite books?

3) what genres of game do you like best?

oooohohoho

I love both..... but I am more on the cat person side. Dogs are more likely to scare me a little unfortunately

Hard to choose, if only cuz I don't do the most reading.... It may be predictable of me but. I do love The Murderbot Diaries. Though not sure if that counts since it's a series. I've also got a soft spot for some of the stuff I loved as a kid, like the Secret Series..... though I obviously haven't read it in a while. Anddddd in terms of nonfiction, I've been recommending basically everyone to read Ace by Angela Chen (or listen to the audiobook. that's what I did. Also what I did for Murderbot)

OK OK SO my top picks are basically always 1. RPGs 2. Puzzle/mystery games 3. Rhythm games. Not necessarily in that order. I love stories in games I like figuring things out (though I am not necessarily good at it) and. of course. i LOVE to jam out.

[motherfactorin-pi-face]

As someone whose veritable fandom curse is that I seem to be almost a Bide-A-Wee Home of Wayward Small Fandoms...yeah, I felt this one, metaphysically :D Actual true thing--one of the more obscure fandoms I still follow (Breath of Fire) had a fairly prolific Japanese fanartist creating art for Breath of Fire IV and Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter (the last game of which resulted in a sufficiently Broken Base that the series has been moribund outside of Japan since 2005, so you had to HUNT for BOF:DQ art in particular). Said fanartist...is also responsible for Hatoful Boyfriend. Yes, the high school dating sim where you are dating uplifted, sentient pigeons. Which turns out to be a *post-apocalyptic* dating sim where you are dating sentient pigeons. And goddamnit, we were GLAD for any fan content or other content at all

in small fandoms you need to be grateful to the person who only accidentally hit you twice with a frying pan while trying to make you breakfast. in big fandoms you can block people for wearing a shirt you don’t like

[oveliagirlhaditright]

That moment when you waited ten years for both Kingdom Hearts III (actually, it ended up being a bit longer than that. But Nomura-san finally noticed that it had been a very long time since KHII at the ten year mark) and the fourth Madoka Magica movie. Heck, Final Fantasy XV, too.

[ladysqueakinpip]

well everyone. just watched mutant mayhem. excellent.

[owari--hajimari]

god i fucking love the bravery mechanic in twewy!!!

it's such a genius way to handle gender locking equipment without anything actually being gender-locked. and i think it touches on something that is one; real, and two; a slice of the cultural atmosphere twewy was created in, like a lot of things in this game are. like, yeah you DO have to be braver to wear womens clothing generally, performing femininity has a higher barrier of entry, and especially so in 2007.

and i love love love the BRV requirements varying by brand/style as well, like yeah it DOES take a lot of bravery to wear gothic lolita. that for sure takes so much more courage than wearing a cheap solid colour t-shirt.

i'm of course never ever getting over joshua having the second highest base bravery after shiki, aka the highest of the guys, but more interesting than that to me is beat having the lowest. like. until post-game changes the relationship with brv as a stat, bravery = femininity, or at least comfort with with performing femininity. so shiki at 109 base BRV > joshua at 39 > neku at 14 > and beat at 4, is absolutely stellar characterization, for all of them. because it makes so so much sense, and it’s shown!

if BRV were purely “bravery” in the most literal sense with no relation to gender, then i wouldn't understand beat having a lower base stat than neku. i do not think there is a world where beat is less courageous than neku of day 1. but beat is ABSOLUTELY more MASCULINE than neku, what with his big boy machismo talk like “don't get your panties in a twist” and “you man up any yet? ‘cause i don’t believe in hittin’ women and children”. the idea of what a “man” is, something “strong”, something as far away as possible from “women” or “weakness”, is something incredibly important to beat! and that makes it known in his BRV stat! (and there is an irony in that. beat being tethered as he is to the ideal of masculinity and therefore strength, can’t equip the strongest threads without the most significant grinding of BRV…)

and of course the relationship BRV has with femininity largely falls apart with the appearance of post-game threads with absurd BRV requirements, but there’s still a little something to be said about the item with the highest BRV requirement in the game being one with a character-specific ability for joshua.

[lapinparka]

Yes to all these tags! (And the rest but I just wanted to respond to these particular ones.)

I feel the fact that the choice being paralleled in a more palatable way in NEO is possibly a reason for the increase in people misunderstanding the original after NEO's release, since people are viewing it retroactively through that lens (similarly to how people will paste Hazuki's role as an outsider and general personality back onto Joshua, because while Hazuki may have gone through with destroying his city which was actually one of the districts Joshua was trying to protect from what he perceived as Shibuya's toxic influence, it's easier for people to deal with a guy who's seemingly easy going and detached from the RG and appears for 5 minutes, than it is with Joshua's messiness and painful proximity to his own humanity and the fact that he's scattered himself across TWEWY's narrative and you really have to dig to find the parts of himself he's trying to hide.)

And yes to the Composer thing as well! Before the reveal, Neku had stepped into that room prepared to take down the Composer (who he thought was Hanekoma at the time). Ultimately, he was still hurtling down the same path Joshua walked, despite his development. And if he'd pulled the trigger and been forced into that same position of isolation and perpetual loneliness, then he would've ended up just like Joshua did. The cycle would've repeated. But he cared about Joshua and broke that cycle. Enough that he offers Joshua the thing Composerhood should have eternally denied him via a simple invitation at the end.

One of the things I really love about Neku is how I feel he's written as person first and a playable character second.

This is obviously clear in the beginning, where a lot of his actions or thoughts will end up frustrating the player, or outright making them hate him. But I think it comes back at the end too, during the final duel, at the point where his development has made a lot of people forget the kind of person he was at the start.

There's a lot of cases where people don't understand why Neku lowers the gun, or complain about him doing it. I've actually seen instances of people either mad that he doesn't shoot, try to rationalise it by believing his final entry fee is the bullets in his gun (despite this contradicting the outcome of the scene), or at one point, in the comments of a YouTube video, claim that the scene should've had two choices, which allows the player to pick whether he pulls the trigger or not.

These kind of reactions fundamentally miss the fact that Neku is not the player. He is not a self-insert character. There are points in the game when he is conflicted, where you can choose between two things and he'll do either - but when he's truly set on something, there's nothing you can do to make him stray from that path. He won't abandon Sota. He won't join Megumi. And he won't shoot Joshua. You're not even given a choice in the last situation, because it was never about you.

Many other games would have the option to shoot, and moreover, would have the choice to lower the gun result in the Bad Ending. This is why people are fine with him aiding Sota or turning down Megumi - because those are the classically "heroic" options. Choosing one boy over a city of people - the same boy who just revealed he caused Neku's death - is not generically, universally relatable, or feel good, and the scene itself reflects this too. It's sombre, painful, accompanied by tears. It's Neku making a choice that he believes will result in Shibuya's destruction, a choice the average player absolutely would not make, and that's what causes the confusion or anger. It also really serves to reinforce how Neku understands Joshua in a way both people in Joshua's own life and people watching him through the screen don't.

Neku will connect with people you dislike. Neku will make choices you disapprove of. Neku won't shoot Joshua, ever. The game itself asks you to try and understand why he does this, like Neku himself tries to understand those around him, but some players just won't make that effort.

Neku is such a good character because you can relate to him, you can try to understand him, but he isn't and will never be you.

[mageknight14]

Dissecting the Femme Fatale Archetype: A Dive into Kanon Tachibana's Character

Kanon Tachibana is one of my favorite TWEWY supporting cast members. Probably not a truly unique opinion, as she's one of the more positively-received characters I've seen when it comes to online opinions on the game, but she's one of my favorites because she’s a perfect example of NEO’s more subtle character writing and gets the perspective flipped on her twice when you initially play through the game and then replay it. So, with that, let's get into her character and what makes her tick in particular.

When we first meet her, she doesn’t make the best first impression, what with her stealing the hard-earned victory pin from Rindo/Fret’s noses and sweet-talking them into letting her keep it (I also love how she glares at Shiba’s announcement, having seen this old song and dance).

Combine this with what the Social Network says about her leading other teams to their doom thanks to her honeyed words and sweet disposition and what we seemingly have is a classic case of the femme fatale character, someone who’s NOT to be trusted.

However, as we progress through the game, we can see that there’s actually a lot more to her than meets the eye. Even after point-sniping them, she still comes forward to give the Twisters advice from time-to-time when it comes to matters regarding the Game. Encouraging them to take on more team members, warning against going up to fight the Ruinbringers (Susukichi in particular), all that jazz.

At the same time, however, she also takes care to reaffirm that she’s also suspicious of the Twisters and their capabilities, often showing surprising amounts of protectiveness when it comes to the other team leaders. These switches between friendly teasing and hard-hitting accusations understandably unnerve the team a bit.

On top of that, throughout the weeks, she also shows a talent for picking apart Fret's surface-level compliments/attempts at flattery, herself being an expert when it comes to that sort of thing as noted by her Social Network profile.

While she is mainly looking out for herself and the Variabeauties, she also does have a sense of honor/fair-play when it comes to be able to fight on an even playing field, which she showcases in her alliance proposal to the Twisters on W2D3.

In the span of one convo, she was able to:

-Pick out that the Twisters are the biggest wild cards in the structure of the Game and note them as such, giving them incentive to look into their own capabilities and find her offer more appealing when weighing their options.

-Play into their doubts regarding the Game and reaffirm to them that this is really the only option they have left at this point if they want to have any hope of actually escaping.

-Blow away Fret’s preconceptions that she’s just as ingenuine as he is as shown by his nervous laughter

-Emphasize that if they’re able to pull it off, it’s a win-win for everyone involved.

It’s made apparent that Kanon is an incredibly skilled negotiator, though understandably Rindo still has her doubts about her because she’s been equal parts threatening and supportive, which sends a mixed message. Who’s to say where her allegiance truly lies?

However, a surprisingly strong affirmation on her convictions comes from no one other than Motoi himself, who actually vouches for Kanon’s intentions and belief in the Twisters being genuine on her part. This along with Swallow’s prodding later on gets Rindo to change his tune. Now, there’s a dozen different interpretations on why Motoi would go out of his way to vouch for Kanon’s character but the fact that he was actually right on the money is a pretty subtle hint that they know about each other and how they tick more than people realize…

Then we go into W2D7, where Kanon’s recounting of the Ruinbringers’ activities and her muted reaction towards Motoi’s erasure emphasizing that she’s been at this for a long, LONG, horrifying while, becoming practically numb to it all.

And when Sudden Death in Week 3 comes around, she starts to kick up her critique of Fret and his issues into overdrive, wanting to see him grow for the better knowing full well that she and the Variabeauties might not make it at the end of the week. And unfortunately for her, Fret, and the Beauties, that fear ends up becoming a reality.

The following day, Fret flat out tells the others about how he felt about Kanon: that he wanted to BE like her, finding her genuine nature and confidence in who she is as something to aspire to, and wanted her to see him reach that level.

By then, our perspective on Kanon has flipped: a scheming femme fatale who turns out to be an intelligent, real, and loyal soul. Someone who starts off cold towards the Twisters before coming around to genuinely like and appreciate them (note the little smile in image 2!)

However, this is only half of the real Kanon we get to know and when we take a look back at some of convos within the game, the Reports, and see past Fret’s idealized image of her, we get to see a much more deeper side to Kanon than what was already there.

First, we need to talk about two aspects of Kanon; her hidden resentment of the Twisters/the system she’s trapped in and her trust issues. As noted above, Kanon is quite curiously protective in regards to the other Player teams, even accusing the Twisters of sabotaging them at some points, and this is for one particular reason: she and the rest of the Beauties are in an unspoken alliance with both teams. One where the top 3 teams (besides the Ruinbringers of course) keep their footing by sending new players and other teams to last place. This is something that’s actually alluded to on W2D3, with the Beauties and Purehearts corroborating together to take down the Twisters.

I also want to draw your attention again to these scenes here, where in the second timeline Rindo has Replayed to, Kanon already knows about Fuya challenging the Ruinbringers whereas before in the first timeline she didn’t, hence why she’s a bit more antsy this time around.

The reason for this is because, due to the Wicked Twisters screwing up the balance of powers between the teams with their sheer existence and sending the DRS plummeting to last place on W1D5, Fuya has become more daring/reckless, desperate to etch out a win against Susukichi. While Fuya is noted by in the Social Network to have surprisingly strong Imagination, there's a reason why he and the the DRS are mainly in dead last.

Kanon and Motoi are the most powerful of the (non-Ruinbringers) teams solely because of their ability to manipulate things in their favour despite both being weak in psych/Imagination. In that regard they’re the most "successful" within the constraints of the rigged game. Fuya, on the other hand, while having strong psychic powers, isn't as wily as the other two in regards to their social prowess and failed to keep his team properly motivated and prevent them from feeling demoralized, which is shown most prominently on W1D5 where Rindo uses his time travel to reroute them from fulfilling their duties by playing on their desires in their moments of weaknesses.

With this in mind, it's no wonder that Fuya became so desperate to risk it all against Susukichi. And while the Twisters do almost bring about change by beating the Ruinbringers, it ultimately doesn’t matter in the long-run due to how incredibly rigged the Shinjuku game is and as a result, the DRS are eliminated, getting rid of the Beauties’ and Purehearts’ safety net.

This kind of stuff is what I mean by Kanon being a perfect example of NEO's subtle character writing. At first glance, Rindo's nonchalant note of her behavior in the second timeline isn't anything to write home about, but it's when you look at all these individual pieces and start lining them up all together, a clear picture starts to be formed. It's what makes NEO so fascinating as a work to explore everytime I replay it.

The Reports make it especially clear that the teams have been through this experience for 30 LOOPS, which has left them teetering on the brink of despair and coping with the situation in anyway they can, with W1D5 (as noted before) and W2D4, as well as other segments, exploring this in more detail.

Imagine going through what is essentially a never-ending hell for weeks on end with no opportunity for rest so you come up with a system to at least stall the inevitable before a couple of kids come around to throw that system out of wack but it all ends up amounting to nothing. With this in mind, it’s honestly no wonder that a part of Kanon resents the Twisters for what happened, with her Dive on W3D3 bringing up all of these lingering feelings to the surface.

However, Kanon knows that the Twisters realistically wouldn’t know about any of that. How could they, after all? She knows that they’re fundamentally good kids at their core and knows that her feelings towards them aren’t fair so she keeps them buried to focus more on her tasks. She tries to take all of the responsibility upon herself and not let anyone else get caught up in the crossfire but this leads into one of her fatal flaws: her inability to trust in the capabilities of her team.

Throughout the game, it’s made pretty apparent that both the Twisters (Fret in particular) and the Beauties idolize her, with the latter propping her up as their Kween. And to their credit, Kanon IS a genuinely good leader, one worth looking up to. However, with all of those expectations comes a sense of isolation, a feeling that you HAVE to take on all of the burdens because if you don’t, who else will? This is shown when she splits up the Beauties when the threat of the Plague Noise comes around, not trusting their capabilities. However, all this did was leave the Beauties as slim pickings for the Noise, including Kanon herself. This is actually foreshadowed all the way back in Week 1, where she declines potentially recruiting Nagi because she doesn’t want to ruin the dynamic she and the Beauties have going.

This is also a reflection of how Rindo himself initially acts, not wanting recruit more team members because he’s afraid of getting dragged down into failure and having no faith in his or his teammates’ capability to achieve things for themselves. What’s interesting is that Kanon does it because she wants to shoulder the burden/responsibility by herself whereas with Rindo, he does so because he wants to AVOID having to take responsibility for any potential fallout, relying on someone else to do it for him. However, as the game progresses, Rindo gets better about this, learning to let his barriers down, reach out to others more, and trust in himself and his friends’ capabilities.

In fact, when trying to save Kanon, Rindo nearly makes the same mistake as her by asking Fret to split up, but when Fret shows up, Rindo and co. are down to support him. And although they didn’t succeed in saving her, they were able to grant her the opportunity to die as herself and gain valuable information on combining Fret and Nagi’s powers to combat Shibuya Syndrome that helps them out in the following days.

Overall, Kanon is an incredibly interesting character with a lot going on underneath the surface (in a way, she’s basically Fret’s Hanekoma) and I hope that this analysis on her was able to at least shine some light on her various nuances.

[lilyginnyblackv2]

Sometimes I just want Soriku to end up becoming canon to piss off all the annoying, homophobic dudebros in the Kingdom Hearts fandom.

I just had to deal with one of these over on the Kingdom Hearts subreddit in a post that was asking if Sora was gay. I said that I think Riku is gay and Sora is likely bisexual. I mentioned how Sora's lack of understanding of romance reads a bit like aromanticism to me (as someone who is aroace), but that Sora and Kairi were likely to get together despite being underdeveloped and poorly written because KH is very much so a combination of old school Disney (think Snow White or Cinderella) and a battle shonen series. Both of which usually have poorly written/underdeveloped romances.

The response I got was "These characters are all children." That was it. That was the response. That response could mean a bunch of different stuff. But, then the person elaborated further basically saying that they believe that people like me overthink the series and because "they are kids and it is a kids series" that's why Sora and Kairi will get together.

It was just so baffling to me though, because plenty of kids series have better written romances than Sora and Kairi's and many explore queer themes. Also, Sora and Kairi are 16 now and Riku is 17, literally the same age as Tidus and Yuna in FFX, and they have one of the best written romances in gaming history. So, like...??? What? I once again reiterated that I believed that Sora and Kairi were likely going to end up getting together because of the way it is a combo of early Disney (with its poor character relationship writing) and battle shonen, which lean heavily into "the power of friendship" trope. But the person just stated again that Sora and Kairi were going to be together because they are kids and it is a kids series that was written with Sora and Kairi getting together from the beginning and then they start talking about the very few and limited Sokai scenes that exist in the series and I was just like. "Yeah, okay, whatever. You're just a homophobic Sokai shipper." Then I blocked them because our conversation was going nowhere and they were just the usual homophobic Sokai shipper. lol

Like, I just don't get the insistence that since KH is a kids game and/or since the characters are kids that means that the series must have a het main pairing, that sexuality in anyway can't or won't be explored, or that Sora and Kairi and Riku as characters can't evolve past the KH1 iterations of themselves in this regard (even though the series is entering a whole new saga and taking on a more hyper realistic style and look for Unreality and the hub world of the series). Like, I'm still super uncertain about KH as a franchise right now. My feelings towards it are just not the best, but I am still interested in seeing what - fully - KH4 will have in store for us and where the story may take the characters now that they are older and getting closer and closer to adulthood.

Nomura has stated that KH4 is basically going to be like a soft reboot for the series - entering a new saga can easily overlap with the characters entering a new stage of development and self-understanding when it comes to romantic love and other elements tied to that. Also, I believe I heard that one of the writers for TWEWY Neo will be one of the writers on KH4 and TWEWY series definitely has more of a Teen Vibe than Kid Vibe. So the series moving more in a Teen direction with this new saga wouldn't be surprising.

Usually I just ignore stuff like this, but this exchange just got to me because it just seemed like a really odd position to take so fiercely. And it wasn't even necessarily in the usual "gay = sexual and inappropriate, so it can't be in kids stuff" angle that this argument usually takes. But more so in the "these characters are kids and the story is for kids so any potential romantic relationships will remain simple, basic, and remain hardly unchanged from the first game." It was more like the idea of kids media exploring complex ideas was out of the realm of possibility for this person, which was just bizarre.

Feel free to add to this large rant if you want. But yeah, that was just a weird conversation that largely went nowhere, lol. It's also why sometimes I just hope Soriku happens or, at the very least Riku having romantic feelings for Sora gets acknowledged, because anyone who dares to think more critically about media like KH or dares to engage in queer readings of the series are often lambasted for being ridiculous or "overthinking" and I just...would like the dudebros to be wrong, ngl.

[abnormallynice]

TWEWY Joshneku City of Angels AU lets gooooooooo when you just gotta admit "who am I kidding Im never coming back to this even though I reaaally want to asdfgh I'll just post what I have"

[Wall of text of lore below~]

TW// Suicidal ideation Angels wander the city of Shibiya to lead spirits to the afterlife. They cannot be seen, unless they want to be and have no personal want of emotions or free will. They cannot feel the way humans do. Physically or emotionally.

Angel Joshua arrives to lead away suicidal teen, Neku. But he wavers and Neku decides against his decision. Joshua becomes intrigued by Neku when the teenager goes out of their way to save the life of another, when Neku was so ready to give up on their own. It's a spark of fascination for Joshua that quickly fades, as time goes on and the depressed-teen-turned-hero-friend fades to memory.

Years later and Joshua is doing the rounds in a local hospital when he spies a familiar face. Neku, now in scrubs, doing his medical residency. During a young patient's last moments, Neku refuses to let the child die and his eyes meet with Joshua's. Neku doesn't see the angel of course, but a familiar spark lights up in Josh. He begins to follow Neku's daily comings and goings in the hospital, then outside of the hospital. Despite careful (but entertained) warning from his angelic colleges, Joshua makes himself known to Neku, and only Neku.

Apprehensive and disbelieving at first, Neku eventually begins to believe this angel and they become closer (or as close as one can get to a being with little comprehension about Emotions). Neku decided on a medical career since the day he helped save a (now) friend's life. He wanted to help people but realized that the job was a lot harder on one's emotional and mental well-being. Unfortunately, you lose as many lives as you save in his profession. In talks with Joshua, Neku remembers another thing he loved to do: sing. He never had time to indulge more in this hobby, thanks to his studies but after Joshua mentions how he's got a nice voice, he begins to experiment with the idea of writing music. We also see the two try to make sense of Joshua's sudden interest in human free will, and thanks to a friend(?) of Joshua's, they locate someone interesting: a fallen Angel. He explains that when an Angel falls from Grace and obtain free will, they become human and receive all the pros and cons that come with it. However, it's not an easy thing for an Angel to do; physically and morally. Also fun fact: fallen angels can see other angels, all the time.

Regardless, Neku starts catching feelings for Joshua and the Angel finds himself mentally struggling to make sense of human attraction. It's like an itch he can never reach, much less scratch. Frustrated and unable to get through Joshua's hard shell (or understand his motives), Neku leaves Shibuya without resolution with Josh.

Joshua is an Angel assigned to Shibuya, and thus unable to leave to look for Neku. The time apart does something to him, and he feels what he believes is loneliness. Or heartache? Whatever it is, the thought of never seeing Neku again is horrifying. He does the unthinkable and Falls. When he wakes up, everything hurts. Hurts. He bleeds, his stomach turns from hunger, his eyes ache and tears stream down his face. But he's...happy. He feels exuberant joy. Joshua travels across the boundaries of his world, exits Shibuya and follows Neku's trail.

Neku answers the door to a rain-soaked, ripped clothing, feet bleeding, wide grin now-human, Joshua. He has little time to process the scene before him, before Joshua word vomits all these new sensations he's been having and confesses his feelings for Neku. How else can Neku respond but with a kiss (now that they can physically touch each other) and they spend the night together.

Neku later explains that he needed some alone time to think, so he cashed in a favor. He left to take a break, but then took the opportunity to make lemonade, so to speak. Neku used a friend's recording studio outside the city to write a song and record it. Upon hearing it, Joshua was brought to tears. It was beautifully melancholic, but hopeful. It suited Neku.

A few days on and the couple is relishing this time together... but disaster inevitably arrives. Neku leaves on a bike to retrieve some groceries, leaving Joshua behind with a "Be right back." Only minutes later does Joshua feel anxiety grip him and he knows something bad has happened. He runs the road that Neku took, finding the young man in the street, having been in a traffic accident. Neku mumbles something about a beautiful light, then dies in Joshua's arms.

The days both drag on and fly by as Joshua tries to now live as a human without the person he wanted to be human with. Despite it all, Neku had met good people and they help Joshua through his turmoil. Eventually, Joshua decides to release Neku's song to the world and it grips anyone who hears it. His life is lost, but his voice will live on and fill his (and others) world with music.

Congrats on making it this far please enjoy this [your favorite donut]

[twixtandshout]

#prev. my jaw dropped at proxy!shiki #how could it work

:D I was thinking, like. since the reason Neku was made proxy was cause Josh decided pre-Game!Neku was the person most like him (and therefore most likely to prove him right about Shibuya/himself being irredeemable), what if he wound up picking Shiki instead? For the reasons listed, @qualityrain 's bit about "different ways of killing yourself" being maybe the strongest argument. Sure, as a CAT fan with a ridiculous Imagination stat Neku's custom-built to be proxybait, but you could easily say Shiki happened to visit Udagawa's mural at the right time instead – maybe looking for design inspiration? (Or even as a sort of self-harm?? Young girl wandering the backstreets all alone?) And since "Imagination" is kind of an asspull as a stat, I'd be willing to say you could quietly scramble the numbers on the backend so she could be the pin prodigy protagonist. (But if you wanted to say it's a fixed, inherent number too important to her character to change, it could also be really fun to see how far she could get with just Mr. Mew. And what would it say if Josh chose her that way anyway, despite Neku having more potential?)

As for how it could go after that... I'm not sure, but I'd love to find out! She and Neku could still be partners in Week 1 – if Neku even still dies in this timeline without Josh's interference?? I was going to say it could be fun to swap them so Neku's the dude in distress, but...

Well, assuming they do stay partners here to keep things easier, Shiki couldn't be allowed to keep her memory, or else she'd remember Josh picking her. So either she's got two Game fees or she never got bodyswapped, which is cool and fun! What does Shiki think about herself without her memories of self-hatred and envy? She's only so outgoing and bubbly in W1 because she's trying to be Eri, but if she doesn't remember she has no confidence, would she still wilt? ...Does Neku still lose his memories? I was thinking maybe he'd wind up pulling a Cloud and teaching her how to have self-confidence (despite still wanting nothing to do with her) in a reverse mirror of canon, because he can't stand being partners with anyone who'll only drag him down and they're stuck together, but Neku really does value his memories and sense of identity above all else, so it could very well still be his fee. In which case I guess we've just got two amnesiacs running around Shibuya.

How does Uzuki's "kill your partner and go free" double-cross go???

..........This didn't end up being very much about Josh, but there are just. so many questions here.

I’ve been thinking about similarities between Shiki and Joshua. During the events of TWEWY, both of them are deceiving others with their appearances and personalities, and they both know it. Joshua has more control over this than Shiki, but regardless…

Neither of them want to be themselves. I’d say they both loathe themselves, really. Shiki envies everything Eri is and does, and is glad at first to be someone else. Joshua’s disillusionment and dissatisfaction with the city is closely tied to his understanding of himself; he is its Composer, as well as someone quite similar to Neku, the proxy he’s chosen to represent the city.

After their time with Neku, they value themselves more as individuals. To Neku, it doesn’t matter what Shiki looks like or what Joshua’s done. (Well, that last one matters a little, but not as much as it probably should.) He cares for them and trusts them all the same.

And it’s all so beautifully connected, because it’s Joshua’s fault that Neku’s in the game and met Shiki, and Shiki’s why Neku learned to open up, rendering him able to connect with Joshua. Neku passed from one pretender to another, and they never interacted, but they did, in a way.

What really gets me about this comparison, though, is how they differ in the ending. Shiki’s at Hachiko with Neku and everyone else. Neku invites Joshua, but he doesn’t come. From Shiki’s perspective, Neku hasn’t seen the worst of her until he’s seen the real her. Joshua? I can’t imagine there’s anything worse Neku could learn about Joshua… But he doesn’t show. Maybe he’s not able to, and maybe he doesn’t want to. If the wiki is to be believed, Mr. H’s “Some people can’t take no for an answer” in the secret ending was originally about Joshua needing to be honest with how he feels. I like to think about what that localization could have meant, though; try and connect the two ideas.

Some people can’t believe it when someone says, “No, I don’t want you dead, not even after everything you’ve done. No, I couldn’t kill you to save the city, even if you killed me and you’d do it again. No, I can’t forgive you for what you put me through, but I do trust you. And despite it all, I’d like to see you again.” Whether he looks “down” (ENG) or “lonely” (JP), something about the Hachiko reunion’s made Joshua sad. But he won’t do anything about it. He can’t be honest with himself and do what (I imagine) he wants to do. Shiki’s able to move past her self-hatred if it means doing what she wants to and reaching out to Neku. Joshua isn’t. He’s much better now in terms of self-worth than he was three weeks before, but there are some things you have to settle on your own. Some people can’t take no for an answer, even when that’s the answer they want to hear more than anything else.

IN CONCLUSION: I think Shiki and Joshua should be bestest friends and go to the mall and make fun of Neku’s clothing forever and ever and give each other advice of varying quality. PLEASE.

[playtwewy]

Ummm hi sorry for all the sent asks recently but I would like to know your extended Coco Atarashi opinions since you already like her a lot

Hey, it’s no problem! I love to talk about things, especially twewy lol and i don’t think i’ve ever really talked about Coco much at all so this will be fun! I did organize my thoughts into sections and it got longggg so there is a cut <3

Pre- Final Remix

I never played Solo or Final Remix so I only heard about Coco from fanart and fanfics and then looking her up on the wiki

First, her twewy design is fantastic and probably one of the best ones in the series imo. I love her aesthetic and cutesy behaviors and think her character as originally conceived is cool. To have a Reaper who is nice and has a fun personality while also being helpful and (at the time) doesn’t try to kill you is neat. And she’s a shopkeeper. I liked these aspects as it was another layer of nuance we see to the Reapers Game of the various roles Reapers can take on, and though she acknowledges how Reapers rely on Players to stay alive she still tries to help in her own way while still getting something out of it.

Final Remix & A New Day

The idea of bringing back Coco and making her a little more chaotic, more antagonistic, and more of a focal point in the series I think was a great idea. Her design and the fact that we wouldn’t know much about her lent itself for her to be expanded upon in an interesting way.

I do think its weird they didn’t try to bring Coco into any of the three weeks in Final remix at all, even as like a secret easter egg before she shows up in a New Day, though I guess I can understand why. I don’t know, I think it could have been fun and given more expectations for her personality before her antagonism would show.

Anyway, she’s a fun antagonist, and her and her actions made me interested in what she would do next. 

Neo:

I don’t think I’ve made it a secret on this blog that I have personal problems with ntwewy, especially with how clumsy it is in regards to how it handles a lot of characters from the original, and Coco is also one of them.

First, her outfit is a downgrade for me. She’s still very cute and stylish, but idk her initial design was so colorful and fun and dynamic that anything in a different vein probably would have felt like a downgrade to me. But more to the disappointment, she just…. barely shows up at all. Despite being almost a main antagonist the last time we see her, we just get almost nothing till the last week. 

It’s not her fault, but I do think it’s weird her actions in A New Day weren’t given as much weight in Neo especially when she is the whole reason Minamimoto is revived.

Her implied relationship with Tsugumi is good, though. I wish we knew more about their friendship, but having her motivation be to save her friend is a desperation I like for her character. I support them. I hope they have a summer wedding.

Concluding thoughts:

Since we haven’t had Neo for even half as long as we had Solo Remix, my expectations for Coco were kind of high as I had a lot of my own thoughts and headcanons about her before her debut in A New Day. The Coco in my head is pretty different from the canonical one, but that's okay, I think.

I always saw her as a Reaper who was a very fun NPC, and then with the teasers for A New Day, I had high expectations for her story that even if they didn’t dig into it as much as I wanted, I was still happy to have her there. I still love her a lot, especially when it comes to her OG design and the potential she has for really interesting character dynamics and relationships.