#Irrelevant Video Game Player

[kawaiiiuniverssse]

Ninjago Dragons Rising Season 2 Part 2 Spoilers

Uncle/Niece bonding time!

(Kai and Cole watching over each other’s daughters was one of my favorite little details)

[camellia-thea]

okay. 400 more words tonight and i'm done for the day. i've talked about player character and immersion, then the martian job and player character creation. i've also got the beginning of something about the cons of choice on immersion -- when a player can't push a barrier while playing. such as da2 not allowing me to beat the shit out of aveline and stop her from being the captain of the guard. i've managed to sneak a lion king reference in (lol)

[themindelectricdemo4]

After watching the second episode of tadc I was like man it'd be so fun to explore that concept with a new oc !then I realized I literally already have one. His name is fucking Nanda Otsuka.

[annabelle--cane]

"the magnus protocol had a whole ARG beforehand? what?"

yes! it did!

"oh so I need to have participated in this whole big thing to actually understand the podcast?"

not at all! from the official post-mortem put out by RQ, "while the ARG was not something that was necessary to participate in to understand the magnus protocol, it was designed to contain a wealth of background story and context that would enrich any player's listening experience."

"a wealth of background context that would enrich my listening experience 👀👀👀 how can I learn about this?"

SO glad you asked. sadly, many of the materials made for the arg have been taken down since the game ended 😔 (ex., the official OIAR, magnus institute, and bonzoland websites. (edit ii: I found partial wayback machine captures! see below) though @strangehauntsuk is still up!), so we're a bit low on primary sources, but in terms of learning about what happened:

for a starting point, I would really recommend this video by @pinkelotjeart

it's super accessible, it was made in real time as the game progressed and follows the solving and revelation of clues as they happened, it hits all the major points of the mystery and moments of community insanity while eliding some of the nitty gritty puzzle grinding, 10/10 would recommend.

here's the official summary put out by RQ, and I'd recommend reading through this once you've already gotten a basic handle on the flow of the story and the basic connections between major clues and events. it's got some fun behind-the-scenes info and lays out the thought process behind the puzzles in simple terms

here's the full masterdoc of all puzzles and resolutions put together in the statement remains discord server. masterdoc my absolute BELOVED, masterdoc my bethrothed, masterdoc my soul mate. I'd recommend this as a second port of call after the above video as it either contains all details about the puzzles or links to other expanded docs that do.

here's the narrative summary doc that lays out all the plot and lore discovered in three pages of plain prose. if you just want to get to the good bits as fast as you can and get blasted directly in the face by contextless lore bombs, this is the doc for you. if you don't want to start with the video, I'd say this is another good entry point.

once you've got the lay of the land, some of the game materials that I found particularly interesting include:

the in-universe east germany expat usenet forum, with all content translated into english. most of it is irrelevant space filler with occasional extremely sus lore, but I still found it fun to read through. love to soak in some fictional forum drama.

chdb.xlsx, the spreadsheet of the names of all the children the protocol 'verse magnus institute was studying/experimenting on. EDIT: here is a version of the sheet without any annotations and with all of the names in their original order, kudos to @theboombutton for catching that the commonly shared copy had the order swapped around.

klaus.xls, a (very corrupted) spreadsheet with what looks like the classifications of a bunch of old OIAR cases.

EDIT: have a few more saved materials from the game that I forgot to include.

an in-universe audio ad to apply to the OIAR that ran before archives episodes and kicked off the whole game.

an in-universe video ad to apply to the OIAR, this one is an official upload that's still up from the game itself. you can subscribe to the OIAR's official youtube channel today, if you so chose.

the robo-voicemail greeting from the OIAR's phone line.

EDIT II:

here is a wayback machine capture of the OIAR's official website.

here is a wayback machine capture of the bonzoland website.

(pretty sure both of the above captures just archived the home pages, though I haven't tried clicking all of the links. I'd say they're still worth looking at, the home pages give a good window into the vibes.)

once you start poking around in these documents, you'll find a bunch of links to others with further information, the materials I've included here just contain what I feel to be the most relevant details to getting a broad feel for the whole game. once again, huge shout out to the statement remains server, I was barely in there as the ARG was in progress and only ducked my head in every so often to find links like these. true mvps of the fandom.

[weaselandfriends]

Ender's Game (novel)

Is Ender Wiggin (pictured above as the little brother from Malcolm in the Middle) guilty of xenocide?

Actually, let's first answer a different, but related, question:

What game does the title "Ender's Game" refer to?

It's not as simple a question as it seems. There are three games that have a prominent role in the plot, all very different from one another.

The obvious answer is the Battle School zero-gravity game, where teams of competitors play glorified laser tag in a big empty cube. In terms of page count, most of the book is dedicated to this game. It's also the game depicted on the cover of the edition above.

Yet this game vanishes during the story's climax, when Ender is given a new game to play, a game he is told is a simulator of spaceship warfare. This "game" turns out to not be a game at all, though; after annihilating the alien homeworld in the final stage, Ender learns that he was actually commanding real ships against real enemies the whole time, and that he just singlehandedly ended the Human-Bugger war forever via total xenocide of the aliens. This is both the final game and the most consequential to the plot, despite the short amount of time it appears.

There's also a third game, a single-player video game Ender plays throughout the story. The game is procedurally generated by an AI to respond to the player's emotional state, and is used as a psychiatric diagnostic for the players. Of the three games, this is the one that probes deepest into Ender's psyche, that most defines him as a person; it's also the final image of the story, as the aliens build a facsimile of its world in reality after psychically reading Ender's mind while he xenocides them.

Because all three games are important, the easiest answer might be that the question doesn't matter, that the story is called Ender's Game not to propose this question at all but simply because the technically more accurate "Ender's Games" would improperly suggest a story about a serial prankster.

Fine. But why does the title use the possessive "Ender's" at all?

He does not own any of these games. He did not create them. He does not facilitate them. All of these games, even the simulator game, predate his use of them as a player, were not designed with him in mind, were intended to train and assess potential commanders for, ostensibly, the hundred years since the last Human-Bugger war.

It's in this question that we get to the crux of what defines Gamer literature.

These games are Ender's games because he dominates them into being about him. He enters a rigidly-defined, rules-based system, and excels so completely that the games warp around his presence. In the Battle School game, the administrators stack the odds against Ender, thereby rendering every other player's presence in the game irrelevant except in their function as challenges for Ender to overcome. The administrators acknowledge this in an argument among themselves:

"The game will be compromised. The comparative standings will become meaningless." [...] "You're getting too close to the game, Anderson. You're forgetting that it is merely a training exercise." "It's also status, identity, purpose, name; all that makes these children who they are comes out of this game. When it becomes known that the game can be manipulated, weighted, cheated, it will undo this whole school. I'm not exaggerating." "I know." "So I hope Ender Wiggin truly is the one, because you'll have degraded the effectiveness of our training method for a long time to come."

In this argument, Anderson views the game the way games have been viewed since antiquity: exercises in acquiring honor and status. This honor is based on the innate fairness inherent to games as rule-based systems, which is why in ancient depictions of sport the chief character is often not a competitor but the host, who acts as referee. In Virgil's Aeneid, for instance, the hero Aeneas hosts a series of funeral games (the games themselves intended as an honor for his dead father). Despite being the principal character of the epic, Aeneas does not compete in these games. Instead, he doles out prizes to each competitor based on the worthiness they display; his fairness marks him symbolically as a wise ruler. The Arthurian tournament is another example, where Arthur as host is the principal character, and the knights (Lancelot, Tristan, etc.) who compete do so primarily to receive honors from him or his queen.

In Ender's Game, it is the antagonistic figure Bonzo Madrid who embodies this classical concept of honor; the word defines him, is repeated constantly ("his Spanish honor"), drives his blistering hatred of Ender, who receives both unfair boons and unfair banes from the game's administrators, who skirts the rules of what is allowed to secure victory. Bonzo is depicted as a stupid, bull-like figure; his honor is ultimately worthless, trivially manipulated by Ender in their final fight.

Meanwhile, it's Ender's disregard for honor, his focus solely on his namesake -- ending, finishing the game, the ends before the means -- that makes him so valuable within the scope of the story. He is "the one," as Anderson puts it, the solipsistically important Gamer, the Only I Play the Game-r, because the game now matters in and of itself, rather than as a social activity. In the Aeneid and in Arthur, the competitors are soldiers, for whom there is a world outside the game. Their games are not a substitute for war but a reprieve from it, and as such they are an activity meant to hold together the unifying fabric of society. The values Anderson espouses (status, identity, purpose, name) are fundamentally more important in this social framework than winning (ending) is.

Ender's game, as the Goosebumps-style blurb on my 20-year-old book fair edition's cover proclaims, is not just a game anymore. Its competitors are also soldiers, but the game is meant to prepare them for war; the spaceship video game is actual war. And as this is a war for the survival of the human race, as Ender is told, there is no need for honor. The othered enemy must be annihilated, without remorse or mercy.

This ethos of the game as fundamentally important for its own sake pervades Gamer literature beyond Ender's Game. In Sword Art Online (which I wrote an essay on here), dying in the game is dying in real life, and as such, only Kirito's ability to beat the game matters. Like Ender, Kirito is immediately disdained by his fellow players as a "cheater" (oh sorry, I mean a "beater") because he possesses inherent advantages due to being a beta player. In an actual game, a game that is only a game, Kirito's cheat powers would render the game pointless. What purpose does Kirito winning serve if he does it with Dual Wielding, an overpowered skill that only he is allowed to have? But when a game has real stakes, when only ability to win matters, it is possible to disregard fairness and see the cheater as heroic.

This notion of the "cheat power," a unique and overpowered ability only the protagonist has, is pervasive in post-SAO Gamer literature. To those for whom games are simply games, such powers can only be infuriating and obnoxious betrayals of the purpose of games; to those for whom games mean more than just games, for whom games have a primacy of importance, these powers are all that matter.

That's the core conceit of Gamer literature: the idea that the Game is life, that winning is, in fact, everything.

What sets Ender's Game apart from Sword Art Online is that it creates the inverted world where the Game matters above all, but then draws back the curtain to reveal the inversion. The Buggers are, in fact, no longer hostile. They are not planning to invade Earth again, as Ender has been told his entire life. The war, for them, is entirely defensive, and Ender is the aggressor. And due to Ender's singleminded focus on Ending, on winning, on disregarding honor and fairness, he ultimately commits the xenocide, erases an entire sentient species from existence. He wins a game he should never have been playing.

The obvious counterargument, the one I imagine everyone who has read this book thought up the moment I posed the question at the beginning of this essay, is that Ender did not know he was committing xenocide. The fact that the combat simulator game was not a game was withheld from him until afterward. Plus, he was a child.

Salient arguments all. Ones the book itself makes, via Ender's commander, Graff, to absolve him of sin at the end. They're probably even correct, in a legal sense (I'm not a legal scholar, don't quote me), and in a moral sense. In real life, it would be difficult to blame a 10-year-old in those circumstances for what he did. But in the thematic framework of Ender's Game the book, these arguments are completely inadequate.

Ender has been playing a fourth game the entire story. And this is the only game he doesn't win.

A game is defined by its system of control and limitation over the behavior of the players. A game has rules. His whole life, Ender has been playing within the rules of the system of control his military commanders place upon him.

Their control extends even before he was born; as a third child in a draconian two-child-only world, his existence is at the behest of the government. Graff confirms this to Ender's parents when he recruits him to Battle School: "Of course we already have your consent, granted in writing at the time conception was confirmed, or he could not have been born. He has been ours since then, if he qualified." Graff frames this control utterly, in terms of possession: "he has been ours." He does not exaggerate. Since Ender was young, he has had a "monitor" implanted in his body so the army could observe him at all times, assess whether he "qualifies"; even the brief moment the monitor is removed is a test. "The final step in your testing was to see what would happen when the monitor came off," Graff explains after Ender passes the test by murdering a 6-year-old. Conditions are set up for Ender, similar to the unfair challenges established in the Battle School game; he is isolated from his peers, denied practice sessions, held in solitary confinement on a remote planetoid. It's all in service of assessing Ender as "the one."

Ender wins this game in the sense that he does, ultimately, become "the one" -- the one Graff and the other military men want, the xenocider of the Buggers. He fails this game in the sense that he does not break it.

The other three games Ender plays, he breaks. Usually by cheating. In the single-player psychiatry game, when presented with a deliberately impossible challenge where a giant gives him two glasses to pick between, Ender cheats and kills the giant. "Cheater, cheater!" the dying giant shouts. In the Battle School game, Ender is ultimately confronted by insurmountable odds: 2 armies against his 1. He cannot outgun his opponent, so he cheats by using most of his troops as a distraction so five soldiers can sneak through the enemy's gate, ending the game. At the school, going through the gate is traditionally seen as a mere formality, something done ceremonially once the enemy team is wiped out (there's that honor again, that ceremony), but it technically causes a win. Even Anderson, the game's administrator, sees this as a breach of the rules when Ender confronts him afterward.

Ender was smiling. "I beat you again, sir," he said. "Nonsense, Ender," Anderson said softly. "Your battle was with Griffin and Tiger." "How stupid do you think I am?" Ender said. Loudly, Anderson said, "After that little maneuver, the rules are being revised to require that all of the enemy's soldiers must be frozen or disabled before the gate can be reversed."

(I include the first part of that quote to indicate that Ender all along knows who he is really playing this game against -- the administrators, the military men who control every facet of his life.)

Ender beats the war simulator game in a similar fashion. Outnumbered this time 1000-to-1, he uses his soldiers as sacrifices to sneak a single bomb onto the alien's homeworld, destroying it and committing his xenocide. Ender himself sees this maneuver as breaking the rules, and in fact falsely believes that if he breaks the rules he will be disqualified, set free from the fourth game: "If I break this rule, they'll never let me be a commander. It would be too dangerous. I'll never have to play a game again. And that is victory." The flaw in his logic comes not from whether he's breaking the rules of the game, but which game he is breaking the rules of. It's not the fourth game, Ender's game, but the war simulator game, simply a sub-game within the confines of the fourth game, a sub-game the fourth game's administrators want him to break, a sub-game that gives Ender the illusion of control by breaking. When Ender tells his administrators about his plan, the response he receives almost taunts him to do it:

"Does the Little Doctor work against a planet?" Mazer's face went rigid. "Ender, the buggers never deliberately attacked a civilian population in either invasion. You decide whether it would be wise to adopt a strategy that would invite reprisals."

(And if it wasn't clear how much the administrators wanted him to do this all along, the moment he does it, they flood the room with cheers.)

Ender wins his games by cheating -- by fighting the rules of the game itself -- and yet he never cheats at the fourth game, the game of his life.

In this fourth game, he always plays by the rules.

In the inverted world of Gamer lit, where games define everything, including life and death, it's a common, even natural progression for the Gamer to finally confront the game's administrator. Sword Art Online ends when Kirito defeats Akihiko Kayaba, the developer. In doing so, Kirito exceeds the confines of the game, not simply by ignoring its rules and coming back to life after he's killed, but by demonstrating mastery against the game's God. Afterward, Sword Art Online truly becomes Kirito's Game, with nobody else able to lay claim to the possessive. Kirito demonstrates this control at the end of the anime by recreating Sword Art Online's world using its source code, completing the transition into a player-administrator.

(Though I wonder, how much of a class reading could one give to this new brand of Gamer lit? If classical games were told from the perspective of the one who controlled them, then is there not something innately anti-establishment in Kirito overcoming the controller? This is the gist of many other death game stories, like The Hunger Games, though none of them may be the most sophisticated takes on the subject, more empty fantasy than anything else.)

Ender never fights or defeats his administrators. He never even tries, other than rare periods of depressive inactivity. He doesn't try even though the option is proposed to him by Dink Meeker, an older student whom Ender respects:

"I'm not going to let the bastards run me, Ender. They've got you pegged, too, and they don't plan to treat you kindly. Look what they've done to you so far." "They haven't done anything except promote me." "And she make you life so easy, neh?" Ender laughed and shook his head. "So maybe you're right." "They think they got you on ice. Don't let them." "But that's what I came for," Ender said. "For them to make me into a tool."

Instead, Ender finds comfort in the control exerted on his life. When sent to Earth on leave, he seeks out a lake that reminds him of living in Battle School.

"I spend a lot of time on the water. When I'm swimming, it's like being weightless. I miss being weightless. Also, when I'm here on the lake, the land slopes up in every direction." "Like living in a bowl." "I've lived in a bowl for four years."

Because of this, Ender never cheats against Graff. He could; Graff states several times that Ender is smarter than him, and the fact that they have Ender fighting the war instead of Graff is proof he believes it. But Ender never considers it. He never considers gaming the system of his life.

If Gamer literature emphasizes the inversion of the world order, where games supersede reality in importance (and, as in Sword Art Online, only through this inverted order is one able to claim real power by being a Gamer), then Ender's Game acknowledges both sides of the inversion. For Ender, the games he plays are not simply games anymore. The psychology game, the Battle School game, the war simulator game; all of these he must win at all costs, even if it requires disrespecting the foundational purpose of these games. But his real life? Ender wants that to be a game, craves it to be a game, can't live unless the walls slope up around him like a bowl, can't stand it unless there is a system of control around him. He does what Graff tells him, even though he recognizes immediately that Graff is not his friend, that Graff is the one isolating him from others, rigging things against him. He does what Graff tells him all the way up to and including xenocide, because Ender cannot tell game from real life. That's the core deception at the end: Ender is playing a game that's actually real and he doesn't know it -- or refuses to acknowledge it, since nobody has ever tricked the genius Ender before this point.

Actually, that's not true. They tricked him twice before. Ender twice attacks his peers physically, with brutal violence. The administrators conceal from him that he murdered both his foes; he simply thinks he hurt them. The only way to trick Ender is to do so in a way that insulates him from the consequences of his actions. The only way he will allow himself to be tricked.

So, is Ender guilty of xenocide?

Under it all, Ender believes he is.

The dying Buggers, after reading Ender's mind, recreate the psychology game in the real world. The story ends when Ender finds this recreation, yet another blurring of the lines between game and reality.

The psychology game is different from the other games Ender plays, because nobody expects him to win it. Its purpose is not to be won, simply to assess his mental health. Yet Ender approaches it like the other games, cheats at it and systematically kills all his enemies until he reaches a place called The End of the World. (Another End for Ender.) His drive to win, to dominate, does not come solely from the pressures of the system around him, but from deep within himself, which is what Ender fears the most. But it is here, at The End of the World, where Ender finds atonement, both in the game and in the game-made-real. In the game, he kisses his opponent instead of killing them, and reaches a resolution he is happy with. He stops playing the game after doing this, though the game seems to continue (when an administrator asks him why he stopped playing it, he says "I beat it"; the administrator tells him the game cannot be beaten). It is through this act of love that Ender can escape the game-like system of control that puppeteers him no matter how smart and clever he is or thinks he is.

In the game-made-real, Ender finds his atonement in the same place, The End of the World. The Buggers left for him here, in this place that they (reading his mind) understood as the location of his mercy and compassion, an egg that can repopulate their species. Through this egg, Ender is given the chance to undo his xenocide. But that chance is also contingent on what The End of the World means to Ender, an end to the game, not simply the games he plays but the fourth game, the game of his life. Ender's Game.

[thewritetofreespeech]

Could I request the other players finding out Isagi and Rin are dating a popular singer?

“You guuuys..! It’s true! I’m really dating [Y/N]!”

“Yeah right.”

“Isagi, do you know that the term ‘catfish’ means?”

“Not you too Nagi!”

Isagi had finally worked up the courage to tell his teammates that he was dating someone. It wasn’t like he was ashamed of [Y/N]. Quite the opposite. Being a popular idol singer, Isagi was very proud of their achievement and who he was dating. Just with their career and his aspiring one, they had to keep their relationship a secret for now. But, he was just so overcome with love for [Y/N] that he had to tell somebody, but nobody believed him! “It really is them you guys!!”

Reo sighed. “Do you really think we’d believe that you were dating a super popular idol? You’ve come up with some hairbrained ideas before, but this one is just too much?”

“Why would I lie about this??”

“Clout.”

“Stop dogpiling on Nagi!”

As if [Y/N] could sense his plight from far away, Isagi’s phone began to ring and he answered it. “Hi~ Isagi-kun!”

“[Y/N]-chan!” He thought he might cry seeing them. Only this time it was out of relief, not joy. “Hey, tell these guys we’re dating please.”

“Isagi! We’re supposed to be keeping this under wraps still!”

“I know, I know. But…it’s just my teammates. They won’t tell.”

“Who would be interested?” Reo muttered. But his tone and expression changed when Isagi flipped around his phone and he saw [Y/N]. “Holy crap, it’s real!”

“Quick. Where are you right now?” Nagi asked as he popped his fluffy white head into the video chat. [Y/N] immediately answered with the touring country they were at and Nagi looked surprised. Or at least as surprised as he could. “Yeah..that tracks.”

“See! I told you.”

“Isaghi.” He heard his name from the phone but did not like the tone. He cautiously turned it back to himself to see [Y/N] looking at him sternly. “I’ll call you later.” Was all they said and hung up the phone.

“Well, you had a famous partner Isagi.”

“Tough luck.”

“You guys are so mean to me!”

“Oi...it's not fair...Rin doesn't even have time for a partner. Much less a cute one...”

“They must schedule dates out in advance around games and his training schedule. They'll probably have their next one in 3 months.”

His teammates all laughed, but Rin didn't care. Besides the fact that they were all irrelevant to him on most days, their opinion on his relationship was even more irrelevant than their usually irrelevance.

Rin continued to work on his stretches. Assuming that his indifference would have them let it go, but when had that ever been the case with this team?

“Oy, Rin?” He turned to Bachira  at their question. “How did you and [Y/N] even meet?”

Rin usually didn’t feel nostalgic, but for a moment he let himself remember the past; even if it was only a few months ago. “None of your business.” He told Bachira. Unwilling to share the memory.

The other forward frowned and whined at not giving him an answer. “Come on~! It’s just so interesting! I didn’t think someone like you would be interested in idols.”

Bachira was right (although Rin would never tell him that). He had no interest in idols. He didn’t even know who [Y/N] was when he first met them. It wasn’t their talent or their looks that encouraged Rin to pursue them, but their determination. They wanted to be the best at their craft. They worked hard. Practiced. Trained. It was a passion that Rin could sympathize with when they met at the gym and just started talking one day about their goals. More than that though, he could respect it.

“Come on. Let’s train.”

Bachira whine & pouted again, but Rin didn’t care. He wouldn’t fall behind [Y/N]’s work ethic. He would be stronger, better, the next time they met too. Even if it was 3 months from now.

[wttcsms]

shoujo manga-esque concept with pro!nagi x video game developer!reader. you’re in a bit of a slump, trying to churn out a sequel to your debut game that went viral in less than a year. now, two years after its initial success, you need to take advantage of the hype still surrounding it or risk fading into irrelevancy. you decide to tease your fan base by releasing a demo version of the new game that features characters that may or may not make it to the final cut. one of the characters has special action moves and poses that are entirely inspired by the professional soccer player you accidentally saw play while channel surfing. his name is nagi & after watching him play, you were so captivated by his movements that you found yourself scouring the internet for more clips of him. for the first time in a while, you’re absolutely brimming with inspiration.

meanwhile, nagi is one of the biggest fans of your game. he follows accounts that give updates on the game, has unlocked every single possible ending to it, has found the secret locations that are only accessible when you play at a specific time, etc. as much as you are his fangirl, he’s your fanboy. the only thing is, he doesn’t know it’s you. no one really knows who you are; you hide your face when you do interviews and use a voice alteration effect to protect your identity. he falls in love with your work, first, but his favorite character has to be the new one you released in the demo. not the one inspired by him, but by the girl inspired by you. one of the game developers working alongside you thought it would be a nice way to celebrate you; you even voice acted the dialogue yourself.

so when you send an email to nagi asking him if he would be willing to come to the studio, he of course says yes. he just doesn’t expect to be meeting face to face with his favorite video game character.

[centrally-unplanned]

In news from a different world, last December J-pop idol Miho Nakayama passed away, quite shockingly so at the age of 54. I have no connection to her music or acting, but of course I do appreciate her role in the very early history of video game development and dating sims via the 1987 Famicom game Nakayama Miho no Tokimeki High School, which I have discussed before. I decided to play the game "in memoriam", as it were - it does in fact have an English patch, and you can see a playthrough of said patch on YouTube here. It was time to experience my very own 80's high school idol love story <3.

To the surprise of no one, this game sucks. It essentially had to, no real fault on the developers, but that doesn't change the facts. It is working with incredibly limited graphical capabilities of course, with the average scene looking like this:

Which just isn’t enough for “ambiance” immersion to work, every setting is generic by definition. That can of course be saved by a good plot or gameplay, but neither shows up here; there is barely any story to speak of. Main Guy goes to new school, meets “Mizuho”, realizes she is secretly pop idol Miho trying to live a normal life, they start dating, and paparazzi-types and the pressures of her career get in the way such that eventually (based on your route progression) she breaks up with you or you stay a couple and ride off into the sunset together. Literally by the way, a friend loans you a motorcycle so you can escape the press:

You might be saying “surely you are skipping some things” but I assure you it is nothing important. Neither Miho nor the main character have any personality to speak of, and your time is filled generally by comedic hijinks or just the mechanics of progressing the relationship. There is a fat-faced friend who gossips about school, you have a family that ~exists, there is a stuck-up rich girl you speak to about twice before she kidnaps you in order to serve you drugged food so you will date her (as was typical for 1980’s courtship norms) which happens solely to make you late for a date with Miho to create drama, and so on - it is all as tiresome as it is irrelevant. You can even poke your head into the girl’s locker room at some point, the crown jewel of filler content:

This isn’t even arcade-cabinet-strip-mahjong levels of hot, I know video games of the era could do better than this! Though for all the extraneous plot beats and side characters, I did like “The Trio”, a group of cackling girls who follow you around like a Greek chorus taunting you for your desires:

In another game these fey spirits would devour your organs at the right moment, mad respect. 

Anyway, all of this plot filler is used to stretch out the non-story but in that task it gets a helping hand from the game mechanics, which are a classic example of arbitrary progression gatekeeping. Half the dialogue options are just variants of the same core emotion, and the right answer is inscrutable. You get moments like this one, where Miho is apologizing to you for a misunderstanding:

And all of these answers are pretty dismissive? But the right answer is A, the meanest of them! Guess she has a type, but since you as a player haven’t negotiated her safe words yet you don’t know that and are just gonna facecheck your way through these.

As the cherry on top the advertised “facial expression” system is actually a letdown - it is very rarely used, most dialogue options don’t ask for it, and when they do you have six options:

But you actually never use half of these, and 90% of the time the correct answer is “normal”. At least this was bad in a “too easy” way, so it doesn’t waste your time, but you could just remove it as a mechanic and miss nothing. All of the “interactive” elements could be replaced by linear narrative, actually, and nothing would be lost.

Besides the competitive media mix aspects of the game, obviously. Which is what it is all about, right? This ain’t some random 8-bit idol, this is Miho Nakayama! And even in-game she is pretty cute, I do like the design for the close-up convos:

The glasses-for-disguise are nice with her moe eyes, the details of the shading really pop in an 8-bit context, and really the whole framework of the UI as this sort of flip picture book is adding value here (as opposed to being irrelevant in the location shots). They even give her a bunch of different outfits on your dates because as the heroine she deserves it:

“Ash, those first two are literally just palette swaps” “No man, look, the red one is using dithering to create a fade effect on the colors, implying a more complicated pattern like plaid thatching, while the blue one uses bold lines to imply a striped coat”. It was impressive in 1987, alright! This girl has no textual personality but there is life in this design that stands out from its peers.

But of course it isn’t the in-game graphics doing the heavy lifting here. As mentioned before, this was a “Telephone Game”, where players would be prompted at times to call phone numbers Nintendo had rented out to hear voicemails Nakayama had recorded. These voicemails are, to the best I can tell, lost to us - I have not found an existing recording online. They were only up briefly actually, for a few months after the game was released - this was not an era where longevity for games was considered important. We do have transcripts of them though, and I can imagine that picking up your house phone, calling a phone number, and getting the actual voice of the “character” in the game talking to you - making your heart go doki doki if you will - must have been pretty cool.

(Miho even travels throughout the game, and the phone numbers - according to this blogger - actually use location-appropriate area codes so it feels like you are really calling Osaka or Hokkaido! Very cool…unless - according to another blogger - you got hit with long distance calling charges for your pursuit of troubled love, as was reported in the media at the time. Now that’s authenticity?)

This mechanic is essentially a ludomantic experience that is impossible to capture today, because voice acting in video games is incredibly common; so much so that it would come off as gimmicky to make someone go through such a multi-device process. But since the Famicom couldn’t make vocal sounds, it had to make you use your phone, which created the simulacrum of actually calling a real human outside of the game to talk to. That is pretty neat!

As mentioned, the media mix came bundled with a competition - the winners were the first 16,000 players to submit a “Best Ending” record via the barely-used Famicom Disk Fax system. As helpfully explained in the instruction manual alongside photos of the IRL Nakayama:

And the big prize of a VHS tape of behind-the-scenes Nakayama stuff has been preserved, and is easily available if you want to watch it. Don’t though, it isn’t worth it; it is primarily b-roll footage of her doing typical day-to-day tasks and softball interview questions about “what is her type” with generic answers, stuff like that. Solid C- for the genre. But still, you didn’t know that when competing, right? The pressure to get your game file in was fierce.

I mentioned how the game essentially “had to be bad” at the start, and I want to dig into why that is. In my initial post I linked, I actually made a false statement - I said the development time for the game was “2 weeks”. I said that because the game’s Wikipedia page in English says it and so it is common trivia on the net, but I don’t think that it is true. Even when I typed it in that original post, the back of my mind was going “wait, that can’t be literally true, it is very hard to make a game that fast in that era - these guys are coding in Assembly!”, but I sort of hand-waived it away as, oh something like they were harvesting an existing game prototype or somesuch. But I believe this fact comes from a mistranslation of interviews like this one:

岩田: 坂口さんは『ファイナルファンタジー』の開発を終えて、『トキメキハイスクール』に合流されたんですか？ 坂口: ええ。チームの何名かが合流して、３カ月間くらいでしょうか。で、最後は１０名くらいのメンバーといっしょに京都にやって来て、２週間くらいカンヅメになって、なんとか開発を終えることができたんです。

Or:

Iwata: Sakaguchi, did you join the "Tokimeki High School" project after finishing development on "Final Fantasy"? Sakaguchi: Yes, that’s right. Several team members joined the project for about 3 months, I think. And then near the end of development, about 10 of us came down to Kyoto and we holed up for around 2 weeks until we somehow managed to finish the game.

So what is going on here is the game’s development was a joint production between Nintendo - in Kyoto at this time - and up-and-coming game company Square in Tokyo. And yes, they were literally working on Final Fantasy right before this game, and switched gears to tackle this new project. Or at least some of them did, for 3 months, and then famed-director-of-Final-Fantasy Sakaguchi came down to Kyoto and lived out of a hotel for two weeks doing crunch to finish it off. That fact, probably because Sakaguchi is the famous person reporters would care about, got transformed into the idea that the whole game took 2 weeks to make. 

In this same interview they talk about how, at the end of that crunch, they all went out for drinks to celebrate…until they got a phone call about how the motorcycle in the ending credits is glitching out and flying off the screen, which they thought was a hilarious, beautifully fitting bug for their time together. And that is hilarious, the primary reason I am recounting it, but I also think it goes to show that this was a hot mess of a game dev process. 2 weeks or ~3 months, both of those are not enough time. And with two companies in different cities, doing crunch out of a hotel, wrangling with a record label for a pop idol’s permission, setting up phone line recordings and VHS tapes and a bonus competition using experimental fax machines, all aligned with a media blitz? All for a game genre that honestly hadn’t been done before? I have checked, and you can authentically argue this is the first ever dating sim, at least on a console. People overstate what it is inventing - it is pulling tropes from romance anime and manga, of course - but even that process of transference is tough. This wasn’t a genre yet, and in a way they weren’t even trying to make a dating sim. They were trying to make an event.

One that today you just can’t experience. Very few people care about Nakayama Miho “like that” anymore, we aren’t seeing the commercials or the magazine ads or buying the discount unofficial strategy guide that invented a fake protagonist and never used Miho’s name because they didn’t have the rights. Today you play the game just because it is a game, and when you hit the phone numbers you tab over to a transcript of the voicemails…or maybe don’t even bother. The game was just a vessel for the hype. That doesn’t make the game good, by the way, I don’t want to go that far. The game was a not-very-good vessel for the hype, and an anachronistically better team could have made a better game. It isn’t really worth playing, in the end. But it is worth researching! As an event, it is really cool. As a piece of history, it is probably unique. And I respect the team behind it for that.

[knuckleblaster]

On some level I understand the rejection or outright denial of V2's death: it was jarring and brutal, especially for a character who, at least in laws of traditional video game rivals and the rule of thirds, seemed like it'd stick around for longer. This said, inferring from in-game lore as well as dev statements, I believe V2's death, tragic that it is, is not unwarranted; and that it is commonly pigeonholed into a characterization it does not fit into due to its assumed role within the game.

This is long, so it's going under the cut.

Considering its name, it's easy to assume V2 is a new and improved version of its predecessor; but it is more heavily implied that it's simply a version of V1 with thicker plating, and nothing more. [1] V2 was an attempt at salvaging V1's design after war became irrelevant, to capitalize on the resources wasted on a highly advanced war machine by rebranding it as an adaptable worker, for security and (theoretically) other peacetime activities (...not an innuendo). This was a failure; there's no reason to invest in something so refined when a handful of lesser machines could do the same job [2].

If V2 is contextualized within its backstory, it makes a lot more sense why it ate shit so quickly. It is, out of any in-game machine so far, one of the least suited for survival in Hell. Sentries and Streetcleaners were created for war. Swordsmachine(s) and Mindflayers are scrapheads, constantly adapting to create (and protect) their perfect, lethal body. [3] If anything, it's on the same level as a Drone, able to defend itself in a limited capacity, but not intentionally programmed or built for combat. Faced with V1, something built for perfect, swift destruction, a machine made for peace would stand even less of a chance than normal, even with an equal level of mobility and build.

V2 is also doomed, in a very literal sense, by the narrative. In a meta sense, it does not matter to the game story whatsoever [4]. V1 is the butterfly whose wing flaps set Gabriel's story in motion, but V2 has no such connection to his story, and is thus irrelevant. Even its lore entry is overshadowed by information about V1/its connection to V1. A third fight, as well, was never in the running, not necessarily due to anything in the game lore, but because its first and second encounters are all it needs: a third rematch would be repetitive and messy [5]. The reason for its extremely violent death sequence is to ensure there was no question as to its fate [6].

In regards to its personality; it is oft-headcanoned as loud, irritable, and competitive, but this characterization is more likely due to its color as well as its assumed role as a "rival" to V1; rather than based upon its in-game actions. Although its initial intentions are up to interpretation [7], comparing its actions and mechanics to other enemies fully rationalizes its anger. Although it's fairly easy to enrage in-fight, the criteria for its enrage state is much more specific than other enemies, and it's quite easy to not trigger it at all. Cerberi will enrage after one of its kind dies, Malicious Faces and Mindflayers after a certain amount of damage has been dealt (on Violent). Most notably, as the only other character with a rematch, Gabriel begins his second fight enraged after his first defeat [3], which can imply by extension that even though V2 is taking its second fight more seriously [8], it is still not outwardly angry. Its enrage state is only triggered when its patience is depleted (the player avoids it for too long), or in its second fight when it has been punched with the Knuckleblaster. These can be interpreted as indicators that V2 likes it when the fight is "fair": when it's not being avoided and picked at from a distance, or being hit with its own arm; which is frankly pretty fucking mean. A side note: Returning to its creation, it can also potentially be inferred that V2 was intentionally programmed with a rational, controlled, and even marketable personality, easily suppressed or overwritten for ease of use.

In another game, or if V1 was the protagonist, perhaps V2 would not be dead. Instead, V2 is doomed by its creators, both in-game and in reality. It mirrors V1 in action and Gabriel in mind, but unlike them, it has no place in this story beyond a truly fantastic duo of fights. Although its story has any number of potential rewritings or epilogues [9], its doom was always intended. It's easy to mourn lost potential, and its end is intensely tragic; but I believe it is a tragedy that meshes nicely with the rest of the game's story. V2 is dead, and not a second too soon.

Footnotes:

1.

Along with the lore entry for V2:

V1’s planned production was cancelled and an updated model, V2, was developed instead, using the standardized plating, since durability was far more important during times of peace when no bloodshed was necessary.

2.

twitter.com/HakitaDev/status/1538313328715513857

3. in-game lore entries, can be read on ultrakill.miraheze.org or here in one document: steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2245904838

4.

5.

twitter.com/HakitaDev/status/1538336055681863680

6. "And then V2 dies as hard as anyone could possibly die to make sure people understand he's fucking dead and is not coming back" - dev commentary, 05:08:09 (youtu.be/kaImho5JioI?si=v4_m90nfLOY-DyEZ&t=18489)

7.

8.

9. Notably, Dream's End Come True / v2isdead.com.

[ava-dreel-thinks]

Okay so like obviously I would choose Violet as Clem’s love interest (see above) but I just don’t think Louis can handle the raiders??? But I don’t want to be girlfriends with Violet and then not save her??? But also her ex is over there and that’s just a typical lesbian experience like I think she’d be fine. Louis is like, a softie. He can’t handle all that. And I think he can be annoying sometimes but I don’t want him kidnapped! But I don’t want to betray my girl!!

Oh dude I was pro Louis for Clem, like someone to balance out her serious side and Violet was good for Clem in the sense that they were both practical but hooooly shit. Louis is episode 1 and 2 is pissing me off. He’s so naive and unserious, even in the face of walkers and traps. I understand him being upset about Marlon. Can’t fault him for that, but not taking food seriously? Not being able to face serious issues? Not for my Clementine.

[lesbianralzarek]

boggles my mind how overused the term "playersexual" is. its useful for critiquing games where the devs had no interest in bi/pan representation, and refuse to work the characters attraction into it. "playersexuality" is the result of a writer's cowardice when faced with the task of incorporating any semblance of a queer experience into the actual game. it is NOT when a romanceable character is bi/pan for player convenience. of fucking course they are. theyre also willing to adventure with the player for your convenience. you can heal getting shot by going to bed for your convenience. welcome to video games. its also not when characters have preferences and talk more about one gender than another. thats actually, like, accurate to how most bi/pan people experience attraction. its fine. shut up.

ALL THAT BEING SAID, if you refer to any of the bg3 companions as being playersexual or "actually gay/a lesbian/straight" im killing you. no the fuck they arent. there is no run where wyll is straight and karlach is a lesbian. the player's gender is irrelevant. they are all bi/pan whether you like it or not. die about it.

[copperbadge]

My ADHD video game, Endeavor OTC, used to offer only one player character body type, which is understood to be a form of alien or possibly robot, the graphics are small and it's difficult to tell. I liked having an "Akilian" body because you also got numerous skins to dress them in, everything from "dinosaur costume" to "butterfly-themed superhero". My favorite was the dapper victorian cat followed by the 70s-themed skin with the disco ball head. It was mainly irrelevant anyway since you don't really see the avatar during gameplay.

They've just introduced new body types, and points for saying "Feminine" and "Masculine" rather than "Female" and "Male", not to mention setting it up so you can change avatar easily and frequently. That said, offering me the option to keep my Akilian body or go to a gendered body just makes it seem like they have some real weird ideas about nonbinary people.

Wake up babe, new gender identity dropped.

I suspect they're doing this because they just got bought by a bigger company that wanted "normal" gendered avatars, which is a huge bummer, but we'll see. The Akilian body type still gets the vast majority of the cool outfits, at least. I'm sticking with Akilian unless they really up their game for the gendered avatars' clothing.

[ID: A screengrab of the avatar-selection menu from Endeavor OTC; it shows three body type options, "Akilian", "Feminine", and "Masculine". While the Akilian body does look more cartoonish, the main difference is the hair, although the Akilian and feminine body types are also thinner than the boxy masculine body.]

[silentscrying]

🏀 buzzer beater | chapter THREE.

nba!gojo x manager!reader || directory. || prev. || next.

summary: you thought you'd gotten rid of arrogant NBA star satoru gojo when he left the curses after your first year in basketball management. but when your contract is up three years later, you find yourself working with him once again as the manager for the sorcerers. as you navigate playoff season alongside long-time friend ieiri shoko and the sorcerers' insufferable star player, you start to realize his sudden departure from the curses may not have been what it seemed, and maybe gojo isn't exactly the person (or player) you thought he was, either.

warnings: language, alcohol, sensory overload, mentions of smoking. || sfw. 2.6k words.

FOR ALL YOUR reservations about Gojo, you can’t deny that he is electric to watch.

He scores 11 in the first five minutes, lobbing two three-pointers and then moving up closer, shooting right over Manhattan's massive guards. He passes to Yuji without looking to get him a lay-up, and Kento is getting a good deal of shots in too. The energy in the stadium is infectious, and by the third quarter the Sorcerers are up 98-67. Yaga pulls the starters and lets Yuta and Toge have their moment in the spotlight.

They always play better when they’re on court together, somehow anticipating each other’s moves without any kind of verbal messaging. Toge hardly ever talks, and Yuta isn’t very loud himself; on the court, they’re more in their element than you’ve ever seen them. Their synchronicity in play is mesmerizing, and the Phantoms can’t keep up. Kinji Hakari goes in after a successful Phantoms free throw and prevents Manhattan from getting anything through for a solid eight minutes.

You can’t help yourself—you’re on the sideline with Ieiri and Nobara, cheering the team on even as you make notes. Fushiguro comes off the court drenched in sweat but looking pleased with himself, and Ieiri throws a Gatorade water bottle at Yuji that he proceeds to spray right in his own face before swiping it dry with his jersey.

“Come to join the fun, huh?” Gojo calls to you and the girls as he swaps out with Hakari.

Nobara grins. “Couldn’t stay away.” Gojo winks at you as he readjusts his black headband, ruffling his hair. You raise a brow at his usual brazenness, and he smirks, and everything suddenly feels normal between you.

It’s possible you’ve missed it, just a little.

You’re grinning so wide by the game’s end your cheeks hurt, and Nobara is having a field day with her footage as the rest of the team floods the court and the fans go wild. If you weren’t sure before, this settles it: you’re going to sweep Manhattan.

The NBA playoffs are structured in seven-game series, meaning the first team to win four games moves on in the bracket. The Sorcerers have home-court advantage for the first round as a higher seed than Manhattan, so Monday’s game will also be at home. Then it’s off to the Phantoms' turf for the next two games, and if the Sorcerers win all four, they’ll have a break before semifinals.

“With 121 to Manhattan's 79, it’s looking good for the Sorcerers in round one,” Panda says in your headset. You laugh and tug it down around your neck, shooting Nobara a grin as she corners Gojo for a sideline video. In the short time she’s been here, Nobara’s amassed quite the TikTok following for the team’s page, and most of it is probably fueled by the player interviews.

“Zero casualties,” Ieiri says as she comes up to stand beside you. “Thank the sweet lord.”

“Aren’t you an atheist?” you ask dryly.

Ieiri scoffs and waves her hand. “Agnostic. Irrelevant. Players hurt, zero. Work for me, none. Metaphorical lord, thanked.”

Yuji is hooting and hollering and jumping on Fushiguro’s back, and even Fushiguro can’t fight the slightest smile as he shoves Yuji off. Nobara pulls Yuji off to the side for a video, and then you realize you don’t see Gojo anywhere.

“Hey, Kugisaki,” you call, and she spins to face you with bright eyes. “Where’s Gojo?”

Her brows furrow as she glances at where she just came from. “He was just there. I don’t—huh.” She shrugs apologetically and you wave her off, a no worries, but for some reason something just feels off to you. Gojo’s usually the last one out of the gym, and especially after how well he played today, he should be milking all the attention from the fans. Grabbing your bag, you slip out of the gym and beeline down the hall toward the locker rooms.

You’re done with his weird behavior. You’re going to get to the bottom of it, now.

Turns out, you don’t have to go far. Rounding the corner, you find your six-foot-three nuisance fumbling with a pair of sunglasses, leaned up against the wall.

“Hey.”

He jumps and the sunglasses clatter to the floor, and you nearly startle in return—it’s not often you see Gojo surprised, or taken aback.

“Uh, hey,” he says. “Hey. Sorry, I’m just. I—well.”

“Are you okay?” You feel foolish asking, because clearly he’s not. You find he’s come to a stop just down the hall from your office, and you scoop up his sunglasses and grab his elbow and drag him down the hall.

“Sit,” you say, and something twists in your gut when he doesn’t argue, doesn’t joke, just sinks down into the chair across from your desk. You close the door behind you. “Okay. What’s wrong with you?”

It sounds harsh, but you don’t mean it that way. He’ll beat around the bush if you’re not direct. Might beat around the bush anyway.

“It’s stupid,” he whispers, head in his hands, tugging at his hair.

“I’m sure I’ve heard more stupid, coming from you.”

Your bluntness seems to ease whatever worries he has just a bit, and he says, softly, “Can you—can you turn off the lights?”

Your brain is moving at a thousand miles a minute. And you suddenly, abruptly, get it.

The sunglasses indoors. You seemed off today. Gojo, subdued, quiet, avoidant. I can cover for you. Bright lights. Loud stadiums. One of those days?

Sensory overload.

You’re kicking yourself, because this isn’t new to you. One of your college teammates would get it bad, especially when some huge game was coming up and she was sent spiraling. You and the team had a system for it—dark locker room, noise-canceling headphones.

It makes so much sense you nearly curse yourself out right here for not seeing it.

You flick off the lights, flip the blinds to block out the light from the hallway. Then you cross the room and yank Gojo’s headband right down over his eyes and ears. You don’t have your headphones, so this will have to do for now.

“Oh,” he says.

“Yeah, oh.”

And then the two of you sit in the dark, in the quiet. You sink into your desk chair, resisting the urge to bounce your knee, tap the desk, anything to break the silence. You try to ignore him, at first, and then you give up as your eyes adjust to the dark and you just… watch.

Watch as the shadows and shouts of the team passing in the hallway make Gojo’s hands tighten over his ears, his breath hitching, his head down. Watch as he shuts out the world that’s abruptly become too much.

Watch as slowly, his breathing steadies, the tension bleeds from his shoulders, the grip on his headband loosens, until his hands fall to his lap and he exhales, the end of some great ordeal.

He tugs the headband-turned-blindfold down around his neck and looks at you in the dark.

“I’m sorry.”

It’s not often you hear those words from Gojo’s mouth, and you don’t really know what to do with them, with this entire situation.

“How often?” you ask.

He shrugs. “It’s usually fine.”

“That's not an answer.”

“It’s—I don’t know. It was bad when I was a kid, but I figured it out. I controlled it. It just flares up sometimes, when I’m… stressed.”

You think about him sandwiched between Fushiguro and Yuji on the couch, groaning as Yaga shut down the conversation about San Diego. “Since the playoff bracket came out,” you say.

He looks at you, eyes piercing even in the dark. “I—yeah, I guess.”

“Fushiguro knows, right?”

“What?” His eyes widen and you know you’ve got him off guard, and then something panicked lurches in your chest; you weren’t meant to see those texts. But Gojo’s moved on already. “I mean. Yeah. Kento knows some—not everything. Uh, Shoko knows.”

Briefly, a stab of irritation, or something, flares in your chest. She didn’t tell you.

But then, why would she? She knows you can’t stand Gojo. And it wasn’t her secret to tell; you can’t fault her for that.

You want to push. You do. You want to ask how close he and Fushiguro really are, you want to ask about Geto, about the draft, the blacklisting, the fight. You want to ask what exactly about playoffs has the Satoru Gojo so riled up he can’t focus.

But Gojo suddenly stands, pushing back his chair, and tugs off his headband, twirling it around a finger. “Well, I won’t keep you in the dark, m’lady,” he says with a dramatic bow. You are, you think. You’re keeping me in the dark.

But the mask is back up and whatever vulnerability Gojo’s shown you by mistake is gone, like it was never there. And you realize it’s this that bothers you.

Because you know there’s more than the ungrateful, unbothered NBA star in there, somewhere. Ieiri wouldn’t tolerate him if there wasn’t. You’ve probably, on some level, always known he isn’t truly that shallow. It’s just that every time Gojo seems like he’s human, he retreats faster than you can interact with it, this side of him.

He won’t let you. And that pisses you off.

He grabs the sunglasses you set on your desk and shoves them on before crossing to your office door, letting a flood of fluorescent light in from the hall. It casts him as a silhouette, untouchable as he lingers in your doorframe. Unreachable.

“See you tomorrow, Alley Cat,” he says, like calling you by one of his stupid nicknames will erase whatever softness might’ve come over the room in the last few minutes. He flicks on your office light, and just before he disappears around the corner, you hear him whisper, “Thanks.”

The next day, Gojo’s back to his loudmouth self, and you’re about to shut yourself in a dark office just to escape him.

But at least you know now the reason for his lack of enthusiasm the last few days. And there’s a pair of headphones locked in the second drawer of your office desk.

Satoru Gojo is back and more annoying than ever, and some equilibrium has returned to your chaotic world.

—

It's April 17, and you’ve never been less worried about a game in your life.

Halfway through the Sorcerers absolutely whooping Manhattan's ass, Nobara pulls you aside and points subtly to someone in the stands. “Who is that?” she mutters.

As soon as you register him, you wish you hadn’t.

About halfway up the stands, a man in a stained wife-beater tank and unreasonably baggy jeans stands with a beer in hand, shouting animatedly as the game unfolds. You swear the only thing holding his pants up is the worn-to-hell brown belt with a studded buckle, and you’re not sure how much longer it’ll last. He’s got black gauges in both ears and several tattoos snaking out from beneath his shirt, but at least his hair is impeccably gelled and styled, like always. You know precisely who this is, and you’re torn between laughing and groaning.

“That,” you say flatly, turning to Nobara, “is Yuji’s uncle.”

Her mouth forms a small O as she looks from the man to Yuji, right as he dunks on a frustrated-looking Phantoms player.

“THAT’S MY NEPHEW!” Sukuna hollers, nearly sloshing his beer over the edge of his cup as he throws his hands into the air. Yuji goes beet-red and runs back up the court, head ducked.

Sukuna probably means well. He shows up to Yuji’s games when it matters and he cheers, insanely loudly. You know for a fact he has a slightly-cleaner-than-the-other-shirts shirt for occasions like this one.

But he also has quite the mouth on him, and a temper, and no real sense of boundaries.

Then the ref calls a blocking foul on Yuji.

“WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT?” Sukuna waves his arms and this time definitely splashes beer onto his shirt, but doesn’t seem to notice. He’s screaming like the ref has personally wronged him, and the people around him are either shrinking away with wide eyes or puling out phones with cameras ready. “YOU THINK THAT WAS A FUCKIN’ FOUL? I’LL SHOW YOU FREAKS A GODDAMN FUCKING FOUL—”

“He’s… done this before, then?” Nobara asks uncertainly, and you nod.

“Many times.” You give it another minute tops before security escorts him out.

To be fair, you don’t agree with the call either. Blocking, your ass. Yuji just almost tripped over his own laces.

Nobara tries and fails to stifle a laugh as Yuji drags his palms down his face in exasperation. Cameras are pointed at both him and his uncle. You imagine Nobara will have a lot of mentions to go through later. “And they still let him into these?”

You shrug. “He’s family, and he always starts out sober enough.” To be honest, you’ve always thought Sukuna is kind of funny. He embarrasses Yuji to no end, and he’s loud and disruptive, but the fact that he shows up with his weird perception of put-together and the persistence of his presence is at least entertaining.

Across the court, Megumi’s laughing at Yuji’s bright red face.

Security is dragging Sukuna up the stands by both arms moments later, both of the guards looking incredibly fed up and resigned to their fate of dealing with a drunk, angry uncle for the remainder of the game.

“We still love you, Itadori!” a girl screams from the front row, and Yuji blushes and throws a peace sign her way.

“I love you too!” he shouts, and you swear the girl almost passes out. Megumi snorts and claps Yuji on the back as they move for a Phantoms free throw.

They make it, and you mutter a string of curse words under your breath.

“Okay, Uncle Itadori,” Nobara teases, and you elbow her and laugh. She glances down at her tablet and sighs. “They’ve already made edits. Of Yuji being embarrassed and his uncle yelling. They’re quick with it.”

She tilts her screen toward you, and you see a TikTok captioned YOU SHOW THOSE FREAKS A FUCKING FOUL UNCLE ITADORI LET’S GO.

The free throw doesn’t matter, not really. Yaga puts Junpei in for Kento, and because the Yoshino kid is pretty new and also weirdly short for the NBA—especially as a shooting guard—it might as well be a blatant nice try, but you don't stand a chance to the Phantoms.

You watch as Junpei gets the ball to Gojo and he proceeds to dunk, making the leap look like absolutely nothing. The crowd is going insane, and you almost feel bad for the Phantoms fans who traveled here to watch their own demise.

Almost.

“And that’d be Yuji Itadori’s uncle getting escorted by security once again,” Panda says in your ear. “Gotta hand it to him, he’s persistent.”

“Understatement of the year,” Zenin replies. “Oh, and there goes Satoru ‘Six-Eyes’ Gojo with the dunk! And we’re looking at another forty-point deficit at the end of the third quarter. If the Phantoms can come back from this, color me impressed.”

The buzzer signals the end of the third, and you stand back as the team meets on the sideline. Gojo catches your eye over Fushiguro’s head and grins.

Ieiri’s shoving water bottles at everyone while Yaga and Kusakabe tell them not to get complacent. “We might be kicking ass now, but next game they’ll be on their home turf. You get a handle on their habits now and you don’t let go until the series is over, you hear me?” Yaga shouts.

The team choruses an agreement of yessirs and hell yeahs, and then the fourth quarter is in full swing. Ieiri appears beside you and yawns.

“How many hours?” You know she can hardly ever sleep, but the bags under her eyes are more pronounced than normal.

She shrugs. “I dunno. Three? Maybe? Tell me we’re rooming in New York so we can smoke out the window and talk shit.”

You grin. “Per usual.”

Nobara will be in a room on the same level with one of the assistants, and you’ve paired the guys off the usual way. Gojo and Nanami, Yuji and Megumi, Yuta and Toge. You don’t care if they stick to it, but the names are at least there for the sake of record-keeping. And the team doesn’t typically drift from these arrangements, anyway.

One of the Phantoms’ bigger players seems to have it out for Megumi, and he’s getting more brazen as the score deficit gets higher. Megumi leaps over the player’s outstretched leg and throws his arms up at the ref, and thankfully the ref agrees and fouls him.

“Not slick,” Ieiri mutters, and you nod. Some of the most blatant tripping you’ve seen in years in the NBA.

Megumi takes the free throws and nails both, seemingly unfazed by his own success as the ball goes back into play. Yuji, however, is having a field day and grinning like an idiot.

“That’s our boy!” Gojo shouts, and you don’t have to look to know Fushiguro’s rolling his eyes. The enthusiasm warms your skin, blood humming as the clock counts down. In three days, you’ll all be in New York.

With under a minute left, they’re just having fun now. Itadori makes some obscure hand motion at Gojo and then lobs the ball high to the left of the hoop, and Gojo leaps to dunk. You’re very familiar with that move. It’s always been your favorite.

“A second win for the Sorcerers!” Zenin yells as the clock hits zero, and the guys hoot and holler and gather in the center of the court. “You know what that means, folks. Manhattan's really gonna have to step up their game at home Thursday if they want a chance at advancing…”

“We love you, Satoru!” a group of three girls shout from somewhere in the stands, and Gojo locates them immediately, winking and making a heart with his hands, sending them swooning. Dumbass, you think.

And then he turns back to his team, and somehow winds up looking right at you. Alley-oop, he mouths, and you roll your eyes and wave him off.

You’re pretty sure his smile gets even bigger.

directory. || prev. || next.

jjk taglist open: just send me a message!

@shutuppeter @mikikkoo

[lividria]

Every (Serious) Prediction I Had for DELTARUNE Chapters 3 & 4

exactly what it says on the tin, just about everything I had some degree of confidence in would happen while having avoided subscribing to any particular major theories lol, obviously spoilers and all that, i'll throw in a couple predictions i made as i was playing too

obviously even besides everything i had written here the general way things went was absolutely nothing like i expected lol

i had an entire like soundcloud take parody planned out to make fun of how ridiculous some of them got but gave up on it due to not having enough freetime to learn music and more pressingly getting outstupided by people unironically doing things so maybe i'll make a post out of that too eventually, but i'm leaving that stuff out of this because none of it was genuine lol

Chapter 3 (Before Playing)

Chapters live up to the hype - HELL YEAH THEY DID

Chapter 3 is the house in general, not just the TV - Mostly incorrect I think

Lots of minigames - Correct

Tenna ruler & final boss - Correct

Tenna lives up to the hype - Correct, thank god

Chapter premise being forced into shows by Tenna - Correct

POINTs as chapter-specific currency - Correct

Perfect score rewards to torture players - Correct, T-Ranks

Tenna fight has a Mettaton EX rating-esque gimmick - Correct somefuckinghow

...But you beat him by making his ratings tank - FUCK.

Toriel is this chapter's Noelle - Incorrect

One of the cops shows up, probably Undyne - Correct somefuckinghow

...But as this chapter's Berdly - FUCK.

Mike is the phone - Incorrect

Mike doesn't live up to the hype, minor role, everyone was wrong about who he is - Correct (Unless you count the fight in Castle Town as "living up to the hype" which no everybody was saying he was gonna be integral to the plot, and those Mikes were literally making fun of Mike theories)

Chairiel character, shopkeeper? - Incorrect

SB is either Technician Theory or the Flowers - Incorrect (Though I'm much more pleased with the SBs we got than I would've been with either of those for obvious reasons)

Remote is a character and got a messiah complex from being saved from the couch after however long they were stuck there, potential SB given they were just given Freedom by Susie, or final boss by taking over Tenna? - Incorrect, I never saw anybody actually say this (Closest was a take with a Rook as the remote) that was literally just my own cooking lol

More Susie personal life lore - Correct

...Leading to Toriel letting Susie sleep on her couch as a guest - Incorrect, I wasn't super serious about that one I just thought it would've been sweet and I guess we kinda got something similar of her going to church?

Knight irrelevant to this chapter, if brought up by anyone only by Ralsei - Goddammit

Ralsei'd chew Kris out for making this Fountain - Incorrect

Reverse Undertale theory, corresponds to Hotland - Correct I think?

Squiddles and/or Midnight Crew references - Goddammit lol

Tenna (And CH3 recruits in general) doesn't come to Castle Town because why would Toriel let you take the TV - Incorrect

Rouxls rematch - Correct

Another milk boss - Incorrect

FRIEND is an actual character that wouldn't be properly revealed yet - ????????????

Shadow Mantle isn't actually here, has greater significance (Gaster's robe in the Mysteryman sprite or something?) - Incorrect, do we even know what it actually is???

Susiezilla doesn't actually come up - Incorrect

SB has Purple Soul - Goddammit

CH3&4 have more scenes for visiting the Shelter like what happened in CH2, and for every chapter up to 6 - Incorrect lol

Video game theming would be some other chapter, probably 5 so Reverse Undertale theory with Snowdin & Ice Palace - Incorrect apparently

At one point months ago I made a joke about Tenna having body doubles that look nothing alike as a joke making fun of takes - I was so close. If I had just said Mike. IF I HAD JUST SAID MIKE. THAT WOULD'VE BEEN THE CRAZIEST CALL I COULD'VE EVER MADE.

Chapter 4 (Before Playing)

Church - Correct, but that was only because of the last trailer so that doesn't really count (I had NO IDEA what it was going to be beforehand, in my take from earlier I mentioned I had the Church as Chapter 6 to be the Ruins since I figured that made the most sense but I wasn't also trying to be correct with that so like whatever)

Chess theory not necessarily debunked by Tenna, they only appear in Fountains made by the Knight - GODDAMMIT

Ruler is Bishop, Darkner version of the lectern - GODDAMMIT^2

Catti, Jockington and/or Alvin - GODDAMMIT^3

Jockington's amount of new portraits is equal to the amount of duplicate ones he had in the files lol - GODDAMMIT^4

Gerson relevance - HELL YEAH

Knight debuts here - Uhhhh... I mean... They do appear...

...But isn't fought - AWESOME

...Their identity not hinted at besides maybe by the SB - FUCK.

...Directly shown to be ordering the Bishop around, Bishop realizes they suck and that's how they come to Castle Town - I mean... The Knight does make the final boss here? I... I guess?

Mayor debuts, only in the Light World - Correct

If the Sweepstakes pizza box does appear in a DW related to it's physical location and not just a random cameo, it'd be here - ...I mean... Uh... Is it too early to write this off? Like, that caveat means I win if it doesn't appear at all or just randomly appears outside of it's context as an SB or whatever... But also wasn't it said the Sweepstakes stuff was noncanon actually or something??? I don't know anymore

New Roaring lore - Correct

New Angel lore - Incorrect kinda they at least get brought up I guess

New Ralsei lore - Correct, though I was thinking like his specific nature as a Darkner not just him as a person so maybe this doesn't count

Reverse Undertale theory, this is Waterfall - Definitely correct, thanks Gerson (Though it also kinda felt like the Ruins at times)

Weird Route either has Berdly funeral since it's the church, or he's in the hospital - Latter's correct

...And he's Fallen Down - GODDAMMIT (AFAIK that's not said, at least, I forgot to check the hospital when I did my Weird Route run)

Noelle doesn't have major relevance again yet - ...I mean... I meant in the Dark World... So... I guess I was right? Kinda?

...Because she'll be in Chapter 5 which is Ice-E's - Prominent theory is Flower King now so FUCK.

Piano puzzles because Waterfall - Correct somefuckinghow

Pianpian motif shows up here as a culmination of the piano puzzles - I'm gonna take Pianpian itself playing as a victory here even if it's not exactly what I guessed

SB is Gerson's Hammer - CORRECT SOMEHOW. SOMEFUCKINGHOW. I THREW THIS OUT AS A BULLSHIT GUESS BECAUSE I HAD NOTHING. This is the one that got me the most out of all the things I got right, this and Undyne

Other SB guesses were either some kind of apocryphal book of the Angel religion that explains the Angel's Heaven is Bad Actually, or the Legendary Artifact - I would've bet way more on those than the goddamn hammer so do I still lose

Pluey is irrelevant - Correct, unless you count them being one of the Mikes but I swear someone made like a half-hour video trying to guess what they'd be and I thought that was the dumbest shit ever (I also didn't watch it)

Another Rouxls rematch, another milk boss - Incorrect

SB has Green Soul - Correct

Predictions During Playthrough

Rabbicks return in Chapter 3 - Sorta correct, with the Ribbicks and the single Rabbick in the S-Rank room

Fourth collectibles in the Boards factor into the SB - ...I mean, you do need S-Ranks, and those do help a lot... But that's not what I meant...

Block puzzles lead directly to Rouxls rematch - Incorrect

Ramb SB - Incorrect but I think everybody thought that, kinda wanna cook up my own take on what his fight would've been like so post coming soon maybe (Is it just me or does his hair shape almost look like a phone? Not that that'd make any sense for him to be the phone, but I thought it at the time)

Tenna's looking for Toriel - Correct I think? It was never specifically stated who that call was about but I dunno who else he would've been after

Tenna kidnaps Toriel - Correct

I'd start hating Tenna once the kidnap reveal happens - Incorrect, thank god

You can enter the "leftover area" - What actually happens doesn't really count, does it? You just pass through it to get back to the part you see in the main Board

Rouxls' rematch will be him in a weather-themed outfit - Incorrect, that would've been so funny though

Tenna's going to kill Toriel for being strict about what Kris could watch - Incorrect, that came from me reading the Raise Up Your Bat lyrics but I was so focused on the minigame because I sucked ass at it I only actually saw a few lines

Something funny'd happen if you rafted to the Atlantis tile early - Incorrect, goddammit

The manhole in the S-Rank room factors into the Egg - I haven't actually gotten the CH3 Egg since I only tried in my Weird Route run where killing everyone seems to disable one of the NPCs needed for this one, but it doesn't seem like the manhole ties in from the instructions I've read?

Cold desert area is the Glaceir - Nope, I saw the leaked song names so I was just trying to guess ahead of time what played where lol, only guess I actually had for what'd play where was Concert For You was the Pianpian motif, which I was close lol

The noodle amalgamate you know the one appears behind one of the Chapter 3 curtains - Thankfully not, though the 1225 secret made up the Would've Scared The Shit Out Of Me factor this would've had

Tenna bringing up the Knight meant they're not an actual Light World person but some kind of avatar of the Fountains/Darkness in general to communicate with the rulers because there's no way the Knight just knew to show up to this random Fountain Kris made, right - Incorrect

For the like 5 seconds when Tenna was attacked before it was revealed it was the Knight I thought it was Undyne attacking Tenna due to misunderstanding him as a threat just as he stops being one - Incorrect, though I was so close to her timing lol

Catti makes the Church Fountain - Incorrect

Tenna actually died - Only in the Jerk Route lol

Batshit theories like Friend Inside Me wouldn't be acknowledged because why would they - Goddammit

Dark-colored door is Dess' room - Does this even count as a prediction like obviously it was lol

Kris ripping the Soul out and storming out of the room meant they were about to make a Fountain in front of Susie & Noelle - Thankfully incorrect, could you have imagined

Segment of running around as the Soul would lead to you either controlling Susie or Noelle - Thankfully incorrect again that would've been HORRIFIC for the Weird Route

Phone's the Knight - Incorrect lol, I called it being the Mayor when it said they'd be right there but that doesn't count

Mayor'd chew Noelle out upon showing up/be a negative presence - Obviously correct, also made me had to pause the game because I Sure Do Have No Personal Problems This Would Stir Up At All Nope I'm Okay!

If Tenna reappeared in Castle Town his arms would be gone - Incorrect but this would've been hilarious, could you imagine him doing his stupid dance animation but without his arms

Church Field theme one-ups the one Church Field theme I found one time that was one of my favorite fansongs - Correct, thank god, all of Chapter 4's songs were peak

If Chapter 4 has a Weird Route, Toriel may die - Thankfully the Weird Route didn't effect the Dark World that would've given me a heart attack with how freaky it got here

Chapter 4 would be my favorite chapter - Thankfully correct, minus the mayor bit obviously

Ralsei's being shifty because he doesn't know the real Prophecy/has the wrong one - Incorrect... I think, I know the theory going around now is the Prophecy is inaccurate lol but like I mean as in he knows the same one we saw here

The Red Things in the black rooms were Gerson fucking around/having some kind of evil alter ego he'd slip into due to being undead - Incorrect thank fuck, you can imagine the fear I felt thinking this might be the case when the Fake Gerson fight happened

Gerson's writing a letter to Alvin - Correct, but that was pretty easy I think

If the Weird Route effects the Dark World, Gerson the Undying - Thankfully incorrect, but again you can imagine the fear I felt from Fake Gerson

...Or you have to kill Gerson in - Also thankfully incorrect, I would've CRIED

Sealing the first Fountain wasn't actually the end - Correct, though I expected a surprise fight like how Spamton NEO cuts you off in the CH2 Weird Route so incorrect I guess

Ralsei'd chew Susie out for making this Fountain - Incorrect again

@friendlyneighborhoodmenace said there was "an enemy I'd really like" and "I'd know it when I see it", and I figured it'd just be a witch instead of anything specific - Correct lol, Wicabel (My big worldbuilding bullshit has a shitton of witches, for context, I'd link it here but nobody's fucking reading my 70-page psychosis because of a Deltarune post ...it's in my pinned post btw)

The weird black orb things get a Smorgs-type fight - Incorrect for now, I assume they're related to the Knight/Titans so hopefully we'll get one eventually that'd be so fun

Final Prophecy is someone dying (One of the main trio, Noelle, or Dess), the Roaring can't actually be stopped, or the main fountain has to be sealed - Guess we'll see

Ralsei saying he wants there to be more than one ending bodes poorly for the Weird Route - Guess we'll see^2

so uh all in all i'm glad i avoided watching all of those super long video essays because i honestly did way better than i expected myself to lol... i say as if anyone will believe i called fucking undyne & gerson you're all gonna think i'm full of shit

[markrosewater]

Hey, Mark, I hope you're doing well! My partner is new to Magic and not as enfranchised as I am, so sometimes on our car rides I tell them about ongoing Magic/Blogatog controversies. We were having a discussion about the "trope" controversy from Duskmourn, and I realized you may be able to explain a feeling I had (note: I'm not asking you to change anything related to Magic or explain why it is the way it is; you've had enough of those asks) due to your long experience in writing and media production.

I think "themed worlds" are fine and good. Put me on Rap Land or the Dark World or Video Game World any day of the week. I'm going to expect certain things in those settings, such as microphones, big moons, or extra lives. However, a lot of players felt like "Acrobatic Cheerleader" and "Bonnie Pall" weren't expected elements of the setting, but rather elements from other properties in that genre. If Video Game World had "Maron and Luis, Plumbers Extraordinaire," they'd probably lose their minds. However, such a reference in Rap Land would probably be seen as harmless.

I don't understand why this is the case (though I'm still trying to figure it out) fully. I figured you might have some helpful insight as to why one feels fine and the other sinful.

I hope this ask makes sense. Thanks for all you do, Mark.

We design not for any one player, but for all players. When we make a set, the reason we explore all the trope space is different players will associate with different tropes. Acrobatic Cheerleader might seem irrelevant to you, but is the thing someone else most wanted to see.

[fishyaudio]

I have done it, I have figured out The Watcher’s theme, and how it it fits with the rest of rain world (I will try to make this short sorry if I ramble)

ALSO SPOILERS (kind of)

Basegame

To me rain world is one of those games that can only truly be understood by playing it yourself, sure, you can read the wiki and watch the very good video essays about it, you can know the story, but you won’t Get It, because playing rain world? Dying over and over again? Exploring the world until you know it like the back of your hand? Dying in stupid ways? Some that aren’t even your fault? Getting so frustrated you don’t touch the game for weeks? That’s the Cycle, that’s why The Ancients decided to dip out, they weren’t just arrogant monks obsessed with death, they were tired, and frustrated, and just done with it, and as a player you experience that, the only out, the only rest, is to ascend, nothing else really matters.

Downpour

Downpour really means a lot to me because it takes what the basegame says, and goes against it, downpour is about how insignificant, small, sentimental things hold incredible meaning, eight slugcats, walking the same abandoned dying word, only separated by a literally incomprehensible time between them, the only ones who share a time period can’t meet again until their journeys have completely transformed them, Survivor and Monk go from pups, to a parent and a capable and independent adventurer respectably.

The slugcats are small, irrelevant, insignificant creatures, Five Pebbles says as much, and yet they shape and change the world around then in small but significant ways, for better or worse, Spearmaster, delivering the pearl that causes 5P complete isolation from his family, as well as allowing Moon to say a final goodbye, (also there is the shelter sign he draws in underhag (I think) and it just warms my heart), Artificer completely destroying the scavenger civilisation beyond repair, I even believe scavengers are so immediately hostile to Hunter, another red slugcat, Gourmand, that opens the gate to allow every lost slugcat a way back home, Rivulet, The Timeline Fixer.

I could go on but I’m really trying not to, where the rain world basegame is about how life is all about our path towards death, and how this is a mercy, peace, downpour is about how life, for as messy and small, has meaning, value, people who care.

The Watcher (finally, really sorry for the ramble)

Also warning, watcher is the only one of these I haven’t played, downpour is destroying me :,)

Anyways.

While basegame is about the peacefulness of death, and downpour is about how all life has inherited value, watcher is about how life is just plain old beautiful.

The world is wide, amazing, mysterious, and when you think you just began ti underhand it, something new comes (and kills you, taking away hours of progress, but ANYWAY-)

For all the complains I have heard about the new dlc, one thing that is a constant is just how stoning the new maps are, the new music is.

Watcher as a slugcat with just has one goal in mind, survive, and to do that, they are just chilling warping around the world with their new bestie.

The Best Echo Ever and Watcher are parallels, they both reject ascension in favour of exploring the world, accepting a Cycle of never ending death and resurrection, in favour of the unknown Void, not understanding why others see that as the better option, and for thought they were left behind.

So now, alone together, they just sit back and watch it all pass by, with jokes and introspection, acceptance of life as it is, with all that it has to offer, both good and bad.

There is also a bit about how the rejection of death is equally as damaging as the search for self destruction, points at the whole rot mess that’s going on, BUT again, I do not have the dlc, so I haven’t have the time to see all that’s going on over there.

That will be all, hope I made sense I didn’t ramble too much, I can’t help myself when it is about my favourite game about depression and existentialism :)

(SPOILERS FOR THE WATCHER ENDING) Its insane that you wrote all of that in just one ask to a random tumblr user because this is some banger thoughts and interpretations I really, really like your take on Downpour and it helped me come to the conclusion why I like that DLC so much and put it into words. Funnily enough, I am a player that lowkey personally disagrees with what the base game had to say about ascension. As much as I understand the motive of peacefulness of death 100%, there is something beautiful in the struggle and our own personal cycles. Basically I value the way more than the ending, and I think Downpour and how the decisions of such small scugs, haha, echo through the entire world with time is an amazing thing to think about. Though my thoughts on the Watcher were a tad different, mostly because the ending I got (SPOILERS) was the toys one - where the child Echo, the OAOA comes to a conclusion of what was binding them to the world - the inability to accept the next step, fearing "walking thorugh the white door" if I remember well. And with that, paired with the Watcher's opening cutscene (in which the OST "Childhood's end" plays) + the toyroom in the ending I started seeing this DLC as one about childhood, from two perspectives. One of an Echo desperately clinging to theirs, a time in their life that they don't want to leave behind, literally playing hide and seek with their slugcat friend in their little make-believesque world and of a slugcat who's childhood got ripped away, forcing them to just stall and observe everything that comes and goes their way in the "adulthood" they were never ready for, one that shouldn't have come so fast. Ironically enough, I think that the DLC really doesn't fit it's name - it puts the Watcher in the role of a protagonist, the most influencial thing in the worlds they traverse through, making them finally have an impact, make decisions that matter and shape the world all around. And not even in a powertrip-like sense, just in a sense of finding joy and peace in something so trivial like adventuring through countless make-believe worlds... or playing with toys. I really like the toys ending, dilly dally and have fun my scug

I liked the feeling of being insignificant in Rain World, this take on the Watcher kinda flips it on its head, but its okay in a way. Just relying this contrast of accepting the next step in life when you're ready for it and regaining the lost feeling of importance, control and the plain, simple ability to have fun.

Thank you for sharing your thoughts!!