#also changed the background color cuz white feels bland

[cannibalmapleshade]

girl i would be pissy too if crowfeather was my husband and the father of my kid💀

[dokidokiliteraturegirls]

 Hello everyone! Yui here, with today’s special feature, DDLitG Behind the Scenes: What’s the deal with Ako?

In this special update we’ll talk about her character in general, design, her place in the story, and more! So get comfortable in your seat, get yourself some good snacks, and let’s delve into the background of DDLitG’s 1st-ish original character~

Who is Ako?

Ako, formerly known as “female student”, was originally one of the many NPCs used by the game’s engine to fill its world with nondescript background characters, so as to make it feel less empty. However, Sayori took a special interest in her, and decided to befriend her, following the steps of a young MC who befriended Sayori in a similar situation and ended up saving her life. This would in turn allow Ako to grow as a character beyond her 1 line of coding and get her own sprites, as well as being able to interact with the world. She would later go on to fall in love with Sayori and shenanigans ensue.

Ako was created with the purpose of telling the story of the Friendship arc.

Designing Ako.

Let me make one thing clear: I’m not a character designer. I don’t know jack about it besides the very basics. But I did try to make someone who looked mildly original and, most importantly, different from the other girls.

Originally, she was going to be the image of a shy, fragile girl who Sayori befriended out of pity, more than anything. Based on this initial idea, I made this beta Ako design on one of my copybooks when I should’ve been working:

As you can see, her very first sprite was the one where she’s shyly looking away to avoid eye contact (and to seem annoying, but more on that later). I was happy with the pose but not with her face, as it looked super unoriginal. She resembled Ochako Uraraka from My Hero Academia a bit too much, so I tried to change her hair to make her stand out more. Here is her second iteration:

This time, I felt like I cranked it up too much to the other side. Now she stood out TOO much. Her hair felt like it came more from a protagonist than someone who’s supposed to be a background character. I adopted a new philosophy after seeing this result: she had to look as bland as possible. She had to be the kind of character you see all the time in the background of an anime - those simple, unassuming designs you’d never look twice at because you’re too focused on the protagonists with candy-coloured hair. In DDLitG’s canon she’s a filler NPC brought to the forefront, and her design had to reflect that more than my desire to make her look “cool”.

With this in mind, we come to Ako v0.3

As you can see, this is much closer to her current design. But this was still a sketch (even the drawing above is very much unfinished). As you can see, I got closer to her 0.1 version with the hair, but changed the eyes to make them look more unique, giving her that more neutral, “nothing” expression. Having finally found some ground I was comfortable with, I redefined her design a little further, gave her some more details around the hair and clothes, adjusted the proportions of her body (because apparently I draw heads huge), and made her finalized design.

I was happy.

What’s with this sassy... monochrome child?

If there’s one constant to be found in the pictures above, is that she was always meant to be black and white. There are plenty of reasons, which I’ll list because, honestly, there are a lot.

1. I didn’t want to look her like the rest of the cast at fucking all. She is an OC introduced in a story with already established characters made by a much more talented writer. She’s an outsider, someone who doesn’t belong with this cast of colorful characters, and I wanted readers to be able to tell that at first glance. No, she’s not like the other girls. They don’t belong in the same place. She is not a member of the original DDLC cast, and it shows.

2. I know I can’t draw as well as Satchely, so trying to copy DDLC’s art style would just end up looking awkward and wrong. I had no choice but to do my own thing. And if I’m doing my own thing, why not take it all the way? I already gave myself artistic freedom, I might as well go crazy with it~

3. I just adore characters in a fictional universe that look different from the rest of the cast or have some strange design choice for literally no reason. Like Krillin from Dragonball, with his eyes that make him look like he belongs in an entirely different manga...

...or even Jotaro Kujo, whose hat merges with his hair because why not!

I live for dumb crap like that.

4. A huuuuuge inspiration for me while writing (besides my own uninteresting life) is music. Many times I listen to a specific track or imagine situations with specific background music to make them seem more real, and be able to better portray the feelings of a scene when writing [For example, I listened to My Chemical Romance’s Welcome to the Black Parade a lot while writing Monika’s Death].

Ako’s creation was no exception. Her appearance was partially based on the cover for not only one of my favorite Vocaloid albums of all time, but one of my favorite albums period: Wowaka’s glorious Unhappy Refrain.

I’ve been writing stuff based on this album alone for years because it’s just so damn striking to me. The picture of the faceless schoolgirl falling into the unseen abyss, the background uninterested characters that imply they are used to seeing fellow girls suffer, the distorted world they live in, the album’s way to explore teenage depression, the freaking name of the album, EVERYTHING! IT’S SUCH A GOOD EXPLORATION OF THE DIFFICULT LIFE TEENS FACE THAT OFTEN GOES UNNOTICED!! AAAAAAHHHH IT’S SO GOOD.

5. Ako was also based on a previous design I made for another character meant for an original visual novel I was writing and I’m probably never going to finish, who was also going to be monochromatic to reference this album (in that context it made more sense though cuz every character was a musical reference).

This character, in turn, was based on Monoko from Yume Nikki, which is more obvious because of her crying eye and extra arm.

So basically at this point it would’ve been weird if I hadn’t made her monochromatic.

Naming Ako

This was one of the most difficult parts, ngl.

As I mentioned, Ako was originally going to be a fragile, shy girl. Based on this, her original name during the design face was Moromi, which is one more letter than “Moroi”, which Google translate promises me means “Brittle” or “Fragile” in Japanese.

However, after the philosophy change that happened during her conceptual stage, “Fragility” was no longer at the core of her character, as it was now “Nothingness/Blandness”. Because of this, I changed her name to “Ako”.

Many people have submitted their interpretations of the name, ranging from its meaning “To teach/to learn”, and “To yearn for”, which all fit better than the original tbh.

The intended meaning is for “Ako” to be read as “A-Ko”, which is a way by which Japenese media often refers to filler characters, as it translates to “Girl A”.

Examples of this can be seen in Super Danganronpa 2, where a character in a videogame is called “A-Ko” to hide their identity...

...and in a movie called “Project A-ko”, which was a parody of the anime tropes from the time, so they gave the protagonist the most generic name ever. The antagonist and side character, by the way, are called “B-Ko” and “C-Ko” respectively. This movie is fucking awesome.

This name also made sense in the context of the story, because we already had a character named “Student A”, so this goes to show that the game just gave Ako the default name it had stored for female NPCs.

Blinded Ako, or How I Learned to Convey Emotion Through Ahegao

When I came up with Ako, she was meant to have most of her character revolving around her infatuation with Sayori. She was, after all, written in the story with the purpose of falling in love with her, and nothing else. Her character, personality, likes/dislikes, and hobbies came afterwards. As the story progressed, however, I decided that she should have a personality separate from just being in love with another character. So to separate the actions she committed under the influence of her passion, I did a little design change in the middle of the arc: Blinded Ako.

In this version, Ako has been literally blinded by love and stops being rational. This is represented by the hearts covering her eyes, and clouding her judgement. This was done not only with the purpose of representing she was past her breaking point, but also to differentiate the Ako that makes mistakes with the Ako that was introduced in the beginning of the arc. Almost so as to make them two different characters, so when she is reintroduced as a regular character after Friendship, readers could think “oh, she’s not going to do dumb stuff again, she’s not blinded by love anymore.”

Many people compared the above panel with “ahegao”, a trope in hentai manga where a character does a silly face to represent them breaking from enjoying themselves so much. This was done partially on purpose. The main idea was to represent Ako being blinded by her infatuation for Sayori, not to equate her sate of being with anything sexual. It DID end up looking more hentai-esque than I expected though, as, well, Ako is in black and white, and the heart eyes are also a trope in ahegao. And she’s sweating. And she’s saying that she’s about to break....

.....

....well at least I drove my point home.

Ako’s musical influences

Above I mentioned how music was a big part of my inspiration, and how I listened to Welcome to the Black Parade while writing Monika’s Death, so the question in no one’s mind is: what music did Yui use as inspiration for Ako’s character and the arc? 🤔

Well, hypothetical reader, the answer is that since Ako was meant to be bland and flavour-free, her original depiction is not based on a song or anything. Her desperation towards Sayori and Blinded Ako, though, are based on TRONICBOX’s 80′s style remix of Ariana Grande’s Into You. And yes, this 80′s remix in specific. Not the original song. I highly encourage you to give it a listen and pay attention to the lyrics if you want an insight into how Ako was feeling during her breaking point.

Also, as a side note, no one has asked me this, but I imagine Ako’s voice to sound like the vocals of Panty and Stocking’s ending, Fallen Angel. It’s a truly beautiful song, and once again, I highly encourage you to give it a listen and pay attention tot he lyrics if you want an insight in Ako’s current feelings towards Sayori.

Ako’s reception

This is more something personal than an explanation of the character, but it’s something I want to share nonetheless.

Remember when I said Ako was meant to be annoying? Yeah... xD

When I decided to add a new character I did so under the idea that everyone was going to hate her, because it’s a purposefully boring OC made by some insane person with the sole purpose of being added to an already interesting and loved cast of characters just to fuck everything up.

The first scene I ever wrote for Ako was the part where Monika asked if she had hurt Sayori, and she said “Not intentionally...” while looking away, which is why her first sprite ever was in that position. She was meant to make people feel frustrated over this girl just looking away from her problems and avoiding responsibility, while also telling Monika to her face that she had done something bad to Sayori. Readers were expected to hate her. That’s why in the beginning she says she doesn’t like literature, to assure you that she’s not joining the literature club. That’s why there’s a scene where she gets punched in the face. That’s why she looks so extremely out of place.

YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO DISLIKE HER!! omg I’m still surprised at how warm the reception was, you guys are just too nice for me~ ❤️

Because of the unexpected reception I had to change some parts of the arc, which were originally going to be much crueler towards her [I even questioned adding the punch at all, but it was an important part of Monika’s development so I felt it]. I also established her as a recurring character in spite of her dislike of literature, and did my best to make her less hate-able than she was originally going to be, even cutting some planned lines of dialogue that made her pretty irredeemable. Looking back, I am glad I did those changes, we ended up with a well-liked and pretty nice girl because of it~

Final thoughts

The introduction of Ako and writing Friendship in general was a very intense experience for me. It was very difficult to balance Ako as being both relevant to the story and moving the plot forward, but not make her the sole focus of everything and have her obscure everyone else, because OCs in established pieces of media tend to do that.

This arc also got a LOT of mixed reviews, some people liking it, some hating everything I did. This made me really question what I was doing and at many points even regret I was writing Friendship at all. At a certain point I lost almost 50 followers in a single update.

I also had trouble writing some parts because they were too sad. And that’s not my style! I like writing happy people being good friends, damn it, not everyone crying and hating each other.

But when all is said and done, I’m happy I wrote both Friendship and Ako into the story. I’ve received many wonderful, supportive messages telling me how much readers enjoyed it. Even some people saying they had been in a similar situation to the one depicted in the story, and were glad to see a story that showed a positive outcome.

Will I write more OCs into DDLitG?

Meh, who knows. I love writing more original stuff and expanding the world of DDLitG, but I also feel like if I introduce yet another OC, people will crucify me and hate me for flooding the story with too much stuff that’s irrelevant to the DDLC they’re used to. That being said, writing this blog is my first, and very possibly last chance to expose my stories to such a large audience. And seeing people like what you do not only because you’re riding the coattails of a recognizable brand, but because they like what you do with it, makes me pretty darn happy. Being completely honest, I’d like to add another character. But just one. And only if it’s something that will push both the story and the girls’ character arcs forward. Not just adding OCs for the sake of it.

Thanks for sticking until the end of this BTS, and I hope you found it an enjoyable read, or at the very least I made you a little bit less bored~ ❤️

Next time, in DDLitG Behind the scenes: What’s the deal with The Perfect Yuri?

[positive-danganronpa]

✿〉Positivity for a Kokichi Ouma who can't bring themselves to eat

Don’t worry Kokichi-kun! I’ll never leave one of my classmates hanging in their time of need.

Though I am afraid I don’t know much about eating disorders so I do hope that isn’t a major issue.

Well I do know that eating at least 3 square meals a day is very important for the human body, it’s where we gather all the nutrients and energy our body needs to function. So staying in your room all day and sleeping isn’t the best on top of the not eating, but don’t get me wrong it’d be worse if you exercised on top of the no eating so I suppose it’s a good thing you haven’t been pushing your body, but that still doesn’t mean that it isn’t healthy.

You should never push your body if you haven’t had anything to drink nor eat, i know from personal experience and it is very tiring and not fun.

Eating is very important for the human body and other vessels, it’s a way of life and one of the key resources we need to survive. I get that maybe there are times when you’re not hungry and that’s alright. We can go a few days or so without eating or eating very little, just as long as you’re drinking water in the meantime is good.

I’m not saying that gives you a free pass to not eat I’m just saying, for now if you really can’t bring yourself to eat please, at least drink some water, a litre a day at the very minimum, you could even go two litres if you wish. I heard 6-8-9 glasses is the average intake of water depending on the development and growth of your body and with the lack of eating I’d say 8 is a good amount if not more. Staying hydrated is very good! You’re able to go a few days without food to remain what can be considered ‘healthy’ so on the days when you don’t feel hungry at all then it’s okay to go a day without eating, but it pains me to think if you were to fall into an unhealthy state of body weight, depending on your age and culture it all differs, the size and weight, everything. But 3 square meals a day should be enough to keep your body going at a healthy rate. Something my food tech teacher taught me was: ‘the more colorful the meal the better!’ (especially greens) so things like fruit salads, vegetable/chicken wraps, even munching on little snacks like celery and peanut-butter is very good! So if you can, you don’t have to force yourself try to munch on a little something while sitting in your room doing whatever it is you please? I mean, if it’s a case of you’re unsure whether you’re hungry or not, and you haven’t eaten say breakfast or lunch or not very much at all, try wiping out some fruits or vegetables, things like carrots, cucumber, mango, banana, oranges are all very good for you and your body. Though just be aware if you haven’t eaten very many nutritious foods in a long while then your body may react in a strange way but that’s just because it’s trying to get use to the new foods, and it’ll improve little things like your energy levels and mood over time.

I’m not saying you have to eat healthy foods 24/7, even mixing in some fruits or vegetables in with something like chicken and rice is very good! It’s a great start. Or say, before bed or in the morning munch on something nutritious to give your body something to work with. It seriously helps, trust me, even if you don’t see or feel a change in the long run it helps... So for yourself Kichi, do you think you could do that? I’m sure your family and friends care about you, and it may make those around you feel more at ease to see you eating a snack every now and then of your own free will.

I really don’t want you to force yourself but just try unless of course you feel absolutely full and couldn’t eat a single bite. I wouldn’t want you getting sick or anything... take it at your own pace, start small and work from there, whether its trying to eat a salad for a meal or adding in supplements like lettuce/carrot/tomato into a sandwich, you know? whatever makes you comfy. But drink plenty of water! at the very least. I’m unsure how certain eating disorders work so I’m sorry if in your case it’s alright to go a day or two not eating, all I’ve learned from being in food technology for about two years now is that nutrients are what make our bodies function at their best and our mental state even out a bit!

Indeed things like atmosphere, sleep and food can affect our mood... i thought it was crazy too dw ^^ unless ur smarter then me on that then i’m just a stup ;p

But in saying all this you don’t have to eat a bunch of healthy foods all the time, as long as you eat 3 meals a day I’m sure it’d be helpful as long as you continue with it. I’m just saying, for now and the next few days eat some extra nutrients! If you haven’t eaten them in a while I’m sure your body will thank you for it, and eating nutrients are very beneficial in many ways.

Also a good tip mainly cuz i think it’s cool your body will tell you when it needs / is starved of nutrients, you’ll become more sluggish and unwell. The easiest way to recognize this is to actually ingest some veggies or fruit, if all of a sudden they don’t taste super bland and plain then eat as much as you can, once vegetables start tasting surprisingly appetizing that’s your body telling you it needs it... i thought that was cool, i mean originally when this happened to me i just thought my taste buds finally matured and i didn’t care about the taste of celery until a few weeks later when it tasted just as unsatisfying as it did when i was a child. just thought that was cool and wanted to share if you didn’t know already

I hope that helps on the eating side of things. But now onto your sleeping habits. Depending on your age we all need different amounts of sleep to remain energized and wake for the day. Adults need between 7 to 9 hours of sleep per night to function at their best. While children and teens need even more. So depending on your age I’d say between 7 to 12! (I use to know a math equation that could tell you exactly how many hours you need depending on your age but I learnt it back in year 8 and don’t remember now sorry) If you’re sleeping more then that, then you must be very young...or over sleeping... my therapist told me that by getting the proper amount of sleep can improve your mood and energy so it’s important to get the regular amount each night. I’m unsure as to why you’re so sleepy, but it could be a result of your lack of eating, so there’s another reason to eat I suppose...

I’m not completely sure what over sleeping may do to your body but I highly doubt it boosts your energy levels very much. I suppose a way to get into sleeping regularly is to make a target time, give yourself 10-30 minutes of preparation for bed and be in bed before your target time! Like my therapist made mine 10:00 PM ! At that time I get off all my electronics and get ready for bed and prepare my books for the next days round of classes, then finally be in bed by 10:30 PM ! For the first week ranging to the first month I felt a lot better and stopped taking naps during my math and geography classes (and I B’d my math final exam too! with barely any study at home!) What I basically mean here is, it can really benefit you to set a scheduled time and follow through, self discipline is key here! It’ll even help you practice your attitude about doing things for yourself and pro-activeness! My mood and attitude seemed a lot more steadier during that period but due to being bipolar I couldn’t really help the swings every now and then. I sometimes fall off the schedule when things get busy but that’s alright life becomes a little complicated and we react in a certain way to it. But proper sleeping patterns are very beneficial to your health, make sure whatever time you set, you’ll have enough throughout the entire night to get you through the day!

And if you’re like me and can’t for the life of yourself remember anything or time just seems to magically disappear, then feel free to set up reminders for yourself, put them somewhere you know you’ll see them! Like for me I put on alarms on my phone (since it’s my life) and whenever it’s 10 and I’m still on the computer or whatever I turn it off and get ready for bed.

You can even make some nice little encouragement reminders for yourself! Like say write on a sticky note to remind yourself to eat or drink! I know you can do it Ouma-kun! I believe in you \0v0/ !

If you don’t feel very tired or you can’t sleep, then try meditating to calm your mind a bit. Even something as laying down and concentrate on your breathing can send you to a state of calmness where your mind can drift to sleep.

A lot of the time when we are tired things keep us from sleeping which is very annoying trying some ‘sleep hacks’ or techniques may help, but since everyone is different feel free to try as many as you’d like until you find one that fits you!

Things as simple as lighting, temperature, background noise etc etc can also affect our sleeping, some like to were eye masks to shield any amount of light, while others enjoy the dim lighting of a room to put them at ease. It’s not childish to keep a night light or something similar it can actually help some people!

I also hear that listening to ‘white noise’ helps a lot of people be put to sleep, it use to take me hours to go to sleep, but once I stumbled across this thing called ASMR i can fall asleep in less then 30 minutes most nights!

Though it’s not for everyone but you can definitely find what works for you! And by white noise I don’t typically mean the static noise you can hear from an old TV, a soft murmur is a lovely website that has nice examples of relaxing white noise. Play around with it and see what you like, you could even try listening to instrumentals like piano, music boxes or whatever you find to be peaceful. Though I’m sorry if you’re not allowed to listen to music when sleeping. But there are other alternatives where you don’t need to listen to background noise, I’m just saying, they’re nice to listen to if you just need to relax or wind down for a bit too ^^

Uh sorry this got so long, I hope you can find something in here to be helpful to you.

And I’m also sorry for the lack of knowledge in some areas, I still did my best which I hope was enough for you. But if it didn’t help I recommend asking other kin blogs for help with this also! I just want the best for you and hopefully someone will be able to give you the right advice.

Oh but before I go. Let me tell you. In some cases if it bothers or hurts you to hear everyone around you calling you too skinny, just know a lot of the time, they just care and worry about you. I’m no skinny girl, I’m actually rather chubby, so they barely notice when I hardly eat, but I do have a few friends who worry me dearly, and after hearing that some of them barely eat and are trying to loose even more weight, it scares me. And I even do my best to make them eat whenever I can now. As for he people around you, we just worry, a friend of mine came close to being anorexic and because of this I worry about my friends constantly, which means you too. We just worry and care, and you’r lovely, whether you’re slim, large, chubby, cuddly or bony it doesn’t matter as long as you’re healthy and taking care of yourself.

Well I don’t really know how to end these things and I’m too lazy to go through this mountain of words so I apologize for the mistakes here and there and everywhere. Now you have a good day Ouma.

And eat something! With a nice glass or water.

Mod Kaede ♫